I walked through the rose garden, the buds of roses splitting pink as the petals warmed in the early sunshine, and I opened the gate at the end of the garden. Sea’s head jerked up as he noticed me, and he trotted towards me, his ears forward. He dipped his proud lovely head for the reins as I passed them over his neck and stood rock-still as I adjusted his bridle and then put his saddle on. For old time’s sake I could have vaulted on him, but the heaviness in my heart seemed to have got down to my boots, and I took him to the mounting block near the steps of the terrace as if I were an old woman; tired, and longing for my death.

Sea was as bright as the morning sky, his ears swivelling in all directions, his nostrils flared, snuffing in the scents of the morning as the sun burned off the dew. He had forgotten how to walk, his slowest pace was a bouncy stride as near to a trot as he thought I would allow. I held him to it while we were on the noisy stones in front of the house, but once we were on the tamped-down mud of the drive itself I let him break into a trot, and then into a fast edgy canter.

At the end of the drive I checked him. I did not want to go into Acre. Working people rise early whatever their jobs, and I knew that farming people would wake with the light just as I did. I did not want them to see me, I was weary of being on show. And I was sick of being told things. Taught and cajoled and persuaded as if I were an infant in dame school. If one more person told me how well Wideacre was being run – as if I should be pleased that they were throwing my inheritance away every hour of the day – I should tell them what I truly thought of their sharing scheme nonsense. And I had pledged myself to hold my tongue until I really knew what this new world, this Quality world, was like.