‘Yes… From the Basque country. Don’t you remember seeing photos of him in one of the old albums in Cefn Llwyd? He was a dentist, too; he studied with dad in London and they shared a bed sit.’

Sam shook his head.

‘Why did Margaret kill him, do you know?’ Adrian asked.

Jane bit her lip and after a long sigh she got up from the table. Walking to one of her bags, which was still in the hall, she said:

‘I think we’d better open the bottle I brought you both; it’s not an easy story to tell and it may even be a harder story to hear.’

She put the Glenfiddich on the table and Sam reached for some clean glasses. But as Adrian began to pour, Euan started crying in the spare room.

While Jane was upstairs feeding the baby, Sam and Adrian cleared the table, washed the few dishes and wondered, over the Glenfiddich, why Margaret had killed her lover and what kind of wealth Jane might be coming into. When she still hadn’t returned after nearly twenty minutes Sam went looking for her. She and Euan were sound asleep. A little later, before sleep overtook Sam, Adrian said to him:

‘I hope I’m not going to lose Sam Rees… He’s the man I fell in love with. That boy who was talking in Welsh to his sister in our kitchen earlier tonight… Who was he?’

Sam held Adrian in his arms until he slept.

They got to Dolgellau late the next afternoon. Jane had been business-like and efficient dealing with the paper work at the hospital in Wrexham, which was more than could be said for the hospital staff that they dealt with. She and Sam were grateful that Euan had taken so well to Adrian; they’d gone off for a walk in the winter sunshine and discovered a beautiful old walled garden ablaze with crocus, Lenten roses and fair maids of February that Adrian assumed had probably been a part of an estate that the new, sprawling hospital had devoured. Among Prysor’s few belongings, handed over to Jane at the hospital, they found a bunch of keys that they trusted would let them into Cefn Llwyd.

Turning up the drive to the old house Jane asked Sam to stop the car.

‘I want to say something about Prysor’s estate,’ she said, reaching into her bag for the bunch of keys she’d been handed in the hospital. ‘Here, you take these.’

She pushed her hand through her hair and turned in her seat so that she could also see Adrian in the back with Euan and with some hesitation she said:

‘This all may be a bit premature because I don’t know anything about Prysor’s will… I know that we’re all the family he had and that he didn’t have anything to do with you two, so it would seem likely that he’s cut you out…’

‘There’s no need for this, Jane,’ Sam interrupted, tossing the keys gently into her lap.