‘My memory amazes me! But that photograph was, I think, the one which my mother had enlarged. It stood on her writing-desk. His look of distaste amused her, I think. That’s why I have remembered the thing. Could it be that photograph?’

‘Perhaps. It was in a small wooden frame, about this size.’ She measured a space in the air, ten by eight.

‘You would not recognize me, of course,’ I said. ‘After all that time I have grown gaunt and old.’

‘No, no!’ She brushed her hands in the air as if she was swatting flies. ‘No, not at all. But time is, after all, time … and twenty doesn’t last, does it?’

‘No. Alas. But I remember the photograph so well, now that you have reminded me, in my mother’s study, at Faringdon. The little ewe lamb with his first crab.’

She rose and pressed a bell somewhere behind a pot of geraniums. ‘She called him that? Ewe lamb?’

‘I’m afraid so. He was the centre of her universe, after my Papa that is. He came first of all, every time.’

She sat down again, twisted her wedding ring. ‘The ewe lamb. That was his name?’

‘That was his name. Behind his back of course. What is yours? Your name? Do I call you Madame Colcott? I suppose that I do.’

‘My name is Florence …’

‘Mine is William.’

‘That I knew.’

‘It would be all right to be as familiar?’

‘Perfectly. Why not? After all, we are related. By marriage?’

‘You will see how distant I am from James. I never thought of that.’

The dark woman pulled back the velvet curtain and wheeled in a sort of trolley with a tray, cups and saucers, a box of Twinings teabags, a kettle steaming gently over a small burner. There was a plate of neatly cut fruit cake, a bowl of brown sugar, milk.

The woman set the trolley in front of Florence and then left.

‘We are not very used to English tea, you will notice. But Annette has made a valiant effort. Scotch cake for tea. We call it that. But I know that you will hate teabags: they are not at all correct. However …’

She was expert with her cups and saucers. I took my cup and piece of cake, which I didn’t really want, and sat back in the rattan chair.

‘I have James’s letter with me. Perhaps you’d care to read it? It’s his Will, if you follow me. His testament. Apparently I am now the lessee of Jericho, for three years at least. Would that be so, do you think?’

She stirred her tea carefully, removed the teabag and dumped it on a saucer.