I clamp my hand over Emmy’s mouth and we beat a retreat. Outside, in the safety of bright sunlight, I suck fresh air into my lungs and glance back at the boarding house. The glassless windows stare back at us like the eyes of a blind man and for a moment, overwhelmed by the enormity of the job in hand, I feel a knot of unease deep in my stomach.

‘Mum!’ Jack whispers, tugging on my sleeve. ‘Someone’s coming.’

The Mexican, with his averted eyes and sad moustache, is slowly making his way up the track towards us, the dour expression on his face a dead giveaway. What a cushy job he’s been used to. Self-appointed sheriff of a town with no citizens, being paid for taking care of a bunch of cabins so dilapidated there is nothing he could possibly maintain. No wonder he is surly and unhelpful. Up until now all he’d had to contend with were a couple of self-satisfied developers waltzing in once or twice a year to throw their weight around. And now here I am, with my snivelly whiter-than-white urban brats, crashing in on his own peace and refuge. I take the children’s hands and we slowly head down the hill to meet him. I wonder whether to ask him about the letter but it’s hard to know how to phrase the question ‘Have you been sleeping in my bed?’ without sounding like a peevish Goldilocks – besides, there is the small but not irrelevant fact that he has been caretaking this place for the last five years.

When we’d first come, Robert had attempted to cross-question him. What exactly had this so-called ‘caretaking’ entailed? But he’d got nothing more enlightening than a shrug and a ‘No ispeek Ingless.’ Irritated by what he’d perceived as deliberate lack of respect, Robert had been in favour of firing him on the spot, but I thought I’d noticed something else in the man’s eyes, an expression I couldn’t quite put my finger on.

‘Yeah, a willingness to rip us off,’ Robert said sourly once he’d realized that we were now solely responsible for the Mexican’s wages. ‘Besides,’ he’d added petulantly, ‘I hate Mexican food.’

Still, if he’s been here five years, then he and he alone would have been around to oversee the building works to our cabin. He would know where to get the propane for the stove, how to pump the water from the well, how to unblock the sewage and restart the generator. If anyone has an idea how to access the local contacts or find inexpensive labour, it’s going to be him. Besides, dammit, at this point in time, he is the one and only person I know in the entire state of Arizona.

‘¡Buenos días, señora!’ he mumbles gruffly, eyes sliding away from mine.