It sometimes felt to her that Skokholm was a living cathedral. Open to the elements and unrestricted by roof, tower and vaults, but carrying in its soil and silence the sacredness that she intuitively knew was at the heart of everything. The mist was like incense rising to heaven, and the birds themselves were the ministers. Little plovers and waders the acolytes, and the great seabirds the priests and confessors, taking the best and the worst of humanity on their outstretched wings as they hung prayerfully in the winds or were tossed and turned in the violence of the gales. She stole a glance at George, but he too was lost in another world and, though she loved him dearly – and he her – she was aware that in some ways she hardly knew him at all, and that left her with a lump in her throat and she found herself wondering again at the essential loneliness of being human.

Later, when they had unpacked, Molly prepared some hot food. The first meal was always special, and she found herself asking George what sort of bird he would like to be, if he could change for a day. He hadn’t managed to fully hide his puzzlement at her question, but after a long pause he replied, ‘An albatross.’

Though he hadn’t asked her, she’d said, ‘I’d be a robin.’

‘Oh,’ he’d said and gone back to his shepherd’s pie.

Again a deep sadness threatened to overwhelm her. Was it remembering those earlier deaths on the island – the sudden violence amidst such stunning beauty, like a peregrine tearing into a flock of starlings? Or was it her own forthcoming operation to remove a lump on her breast? She didn’t know, but she struggled to swallow her food and was glad when an old friend of George, who was also staying on the island, called at the wheelhouse to discuss a new sighting and she was able slip outside to try and compose herself.

It was there that she found it. A postcard, lying on the ground, resisting the efforts of the summer breeze to move it on. Damp and tatty, it depicted an elephant at Bristol Zoo and carried an American stamp. It was addressed simply to ‘Clara, The Lodge, Clifton, Bristol, England’, and although Molly felt slightly uncomfortable, she found herself reading its unsigned message:

The elephants are still in their enclosure and haven’t forgotten the day we watched them being showered by their keepers. Neither have I. You may be across an ocean, but one day the waves of justice will roll up on your shore. For now I console myself with the memory of those great beasts, and although I too will soon see the world only through bars, one day, my love, so will you . . .

Appalled at her own nosiness, but equally intrigued, Molly showed the postcard to George, who raised his eyebrows and went to get himself another drink, asking Tim, the young assistant warden, if a woman called Clara was on the island.