‘Tell me about your childhood, your family life.’

‘Life at Bridlemere was … abnormal, to say the least.’ Nicholas spoke readily. ‘We led a very isolated life. My parents had a morbid fear of visitors. There was an older woman who came in every day, to help my mother with things, with the children.’

‘A servant?’

‘Yes. But apart from that we were very alone, as a family. And in such circumstances, behind closed doors …’

‘Go on.’

His brows crinkled slightly. ‘By any modern standard, I guess you could say we were abused.’

‘Physically?’

‘Let’s just say that Father and Mother were old-fashioned parents. They both had strict upbringings, and they forced the same rules on to their own children.’

‘Beatings?’

Nicholas looked at Hobbes. ‘Well, you know how it was. It was all perfectly accepted, a way of life.’

‘Yes.’

‘But it was more than that, more than any physical harm, I mean.’

‘Explain that to me.’

‘They liked to play mind games with us. The everyday cruelties.’

Nicholas took another sip of tea. This time he left the saucer on the table and watched as a layer of plaster dust settled on the surface of the liquid.

‘It was a theatrical family. I think I told you that. Their fortune was built on play-acting, directing, storytelling, and so on. The children – all of us – well, sometimes it felt like we were characters in a play created by Mummy and Daddy. Of course, being kids, we took this further, and made up our own worlds, our own adventures, our own heroes and villains.’ He turned the pile of photographs face up. ‘I was just looking at these, when you came in.’

‘Let me see.’

Nicholas handed over the photographs one by one. They showed three children dressed up in costumes, holding props, standing on the stage in different tableaux. Two older kids, ten or eleven, and a younger girl perhaps half that age.

‘This is you, and …’

‘Rosamund. And the little one is Camilla.’ A faraway look came into his eyes. ‘We were happiest like this, playing together.’

‘I can see that.’

‘There was one particular summer, when it was all we did, one play after another. Some of them were things we’d read in books that we adapted. Others, we made up. Pirate tales, murder mysteries, romances, ghost stories. Our favourite was called House With No Doors.’ He laughed at this. ‘We were unstoppable. And so the days went by.’

Now his eyes came into focus, brightened by memory.

‘I was the director, ordering my sisters about. Oh, God, I was such a bossy-boots!’ It was an absurd thing to say, in the current circumstances, and it served to change the mood. Nicholas gathered up his mementoes. ‘Anyway, it’s all a long time ago now.’ He wiped at his brow. ‘I got out when the war started, and I enrolled in the army. That was my break. But my sisters …’ He shook his head.