When she finally caught up with Michael, some days later at the shell arch, they spent their initial moments together in silence, picking at the render, trying to free a periwinkle or a dog whelk. He was still sulking about the way she had spoken to him at Peter Cedars’ funeral, but Viola wanted him to apologise first, for suggesting that she was some kind of murderer. It was Viola who broke the stand-off, desperate as she was for the latest on the lovely Miss Cedars. Michael’s eyes gleamed as he imparted this drama to new ears.

‘Suspended!’ he announced with dark joy, explaining how Mr Crane had told the pupils at the end of chapel one morning that Miss Cedars had decided to take an ‘extended break’. After that, the teacher was seen ranting in the streets on at least two occasions before disappearing: ‘To her mum’s probably. They’re both as mad as each other.’

‘Who threw the paint at her house?’ Viola asked.

‘Reckon she did it herself,’ said Michael. ‘She’s completely dotty now.’

He looked down at the dog. ‘No offence to the Dotty here present,’ he said, and Viola fumed inwardly at his willingness to say sorry to an animal and not to her.

They fell back into their shell-picking silence and Viola knew she must act soon, else her confidence would slip away.

‘You know how you said the Eldest Girls were looking for boys to have sex with at the Sisters’ Stones?’

She was off; it would be done.

‘Yeah?’ He tried for a casual response – he failed.

‘Well, it could be you, and if that’s the case then you’ll need to get in some practice, so you don’t make a complete idiot of yourself.’

The boy gulped. Viola could see his mind leaping frantically from one thought to the next.

‘Practice?’ he said. ‘How?’

‘I’ll do it.’ She too tried for a casual response – she succeeded. ‘I don’t mind.’

Then, before she could question the sense of what she was doing, she launched herself forward and kissed him. They worked their mouths against one another for a while. His lips were dry, uncoordinated, the movement both forceful and boring. Viola opened her mouth and felt him resist this new development. She pulled away.

‘You’re supposed to use your tongue,’ she said.

‘O-okay,’ the boy stammered, and as they leant in to resume their kiss, Viola probed his mouth in demonstration. He clumsily replicated.

‘Now,’ she said, ‘put your hand up my jumper’ – an offer he didn’t need to be given twice.

This was as far as Viola had ever gone, but despite Michael’s vast stores of encyclopaedic knowledge, she figured she was still the expert; she knew what was supposed to come next. She made herself do it – reach down and clutch at the front of his school trousers, feeling for the bulge that was supposed to be there, and was.