Christopher Devon ate alone that evening, with a tray on his lap. It wasn’t as good as his lunch, but that didn’t matter. Normally he would have sat in front of the television, but tonight he didn’t want the distraction. Instead, he ate his salmon fish cakes in front of a roaring log fire to the strains of Puccini. As Katia Ricciarelli soared through ‘Vissi d’arte’ he felt himself transported to another world. A world of calm, a world he had not visited for a long time.

And then it finished. And the room was quiet, except for the occasional crackling of a log. He could not remember feeling quite so emotional since Kate had left. But then he was, he told himself, going through a bit of a phase at the moment. The reappearance of Mrs Fraser and young Daisy had quite thrown him off balance.

Mrs Fraser and Miss Bassani. Except that he didn’t know if it was Miss Bassani. Maybe she was married. Bound to be. She was probably Mrs Whatever. He was surprised that the thought had not struck him before. They had talked about opera and about food but never got round to her private life. He had no idea if she was married. Or had children. Luisa had never said. Never mentioned her family at all until the morning she left. And she wasn’t the sort of woman he felt he could ask.

Stupid really. But then Luisa had only cleaned for him for a couple of months, and for half of that time he had been out on call. When he was there, all his time had been spent trying to avoid her, along with her lunches, rather than trying to engage her in conversation. Now he felt guilty. He should have tried harder. Perhaps when she went home she talked about him and said how unappreciative he was of her efforts. And yet Maria had been so friendly.

Anyway, what did it matter? She was just coming in to clean for him. To help him out while he got himself sorted. And she was being paid, after all.

He took the tray into the kitchen and went up to bed.

Chapter 8

In planning for battle I have always found that plans are useless, but planning is indispensable.

Dwight D. Eisenhower, 1890–1969

The domino club met on Thursday that week. Christopher rang them to say that he would be unable to make their usual date thanks to being on call, so Tiger and Gary had agreed to meet a day earlier rather than postpone.

Settled around their table in the corner of the Hare and Hounds the conversation turned, as it inevitably did in Gary’s case, to women. Except that on this occasion it was not Gary who brought the subject up. He seemed a bit quiet. Which is why Tiger asked mischievously, ‘Go well did it? Your night out?’