1956. All the family are present as the third dress is torn and bloodied. It is hung on the wall of Adeline’s bedroom, a constant reminder of the spell that renews her. She is now calling herself Jeannie, and asks that her relatives do the same. They are happy to go along with this.

1957. Mary Estelle Graves begins her novel, A Spell of Darkness. She uses her own family as a template, and Bridlemere as a model for the novel’s Gothic mansion. The story of Nicholas and Rosamund’s encounter is coded in the pages, as is the death of Jeannie Watts, and the ceremony of rebirth that follows it. And another dress is torn, and daubed this time with red paint. It is laid out on the floor of the attic.

1958. A Spell of Darkness is published. The critics take it to be a work of fiction. Camilla makes another dress at her sewing-machine, following the usual pattern, using the same cloth as before. It is torn, painted, prayed over, folded neatly and placed in a drawer in the master bedroom of the house. There it rests.

1959. Another dress is made, and torn. This time Nicholas makes a cut in his arm, and his own blood is used as the magical element.

1960. This year Nicholas stays away. He no longer thinks of himself as part of the family, and all that it stands for. The ceremony goes ahead without him.

1961. Nicholas starts to think about making a film of his life, his family, and the terrible events they go through. Another dress is buried, this time in the back garden. Later that year, Camilla digs it up and displays it in her room, dirt, insects and all.

1962. Nicholas directs and shoots his low-budget experimental film, The Spell Makers. He uses amateur actors, including, in a bit part, a young man called George Collingworth. The film is never truly finished. Again, Nicholas stays away from the annual ceremony. The family continue, as always. Another dress is prepared, another symbolic death undertaken.

1963. This year Rosamund stays away. Adeline frets over this, worried that not enough people are present: the ritual’s power will be weakened. She especially regrets the absence of her mother and father. But another dress is torn and prepared, this time with Mary Estelle’s blood as a sacrament. The matriarch’s energy will surely reinforce the spell. Surely.

1964. The tenth anniversary. Leonard and Mary Estelle exert all their influence to draw the family together. Nicholas and Rosamund return to the fold. The ceremony takes on an extra significance. Leonard rewrites the script, adding more lines, more images of extreme poetic symbolism. The dress is torn, bloodied, and hidden under a bed.

1965. Nicholas and Rosamund stay away. Adeline is distraught, but she takes her usual strength from the ritual death. The day after the ceremony, Camilla announces that she’s leaving home. Adeline retreats to her room, and cries in her solitude. Her ‘sister’ will no longer be there to protect her, to look after her.