‘How did you guess,’ he asked, after a moment. ‘About Helen, I mean. Was it because there was no card from her? I saw you looking at the mantelpiece.’

‘It was your umbrella,’ Liv said simply.

‘My umbrella?’ In confusion, Valentine glanced over at it drying on the radiator in the utility room.

‘It was last December,’ she began explaining. ‘I’d come up from London to look at houses to buy and I walked into mine. It was such a mess back then, but so was my life. I didn’t know what I was doing. I nearly called the whole thing off, said it was a mistake, caught the train back to London . . .’

She paused to shake her head.

‘But then I looked out of the bedroom window, across the graveyard, and saw a flash of bright pink in the darkness – it was a bright pink polka-dot umbrella. And it looked so bold and brave, so cheerful against the winter gloom; it was like a beacon of light amongst all those headstones . . . It was a sign of something good; that where there’s grief, there’s also joy.’

She looked at Valentine now and smiled.

‘I put an offer in there and then and forgot all about that umbrella until after I moved in. Then I would often catch sight of it in the graveyard . . . when the trees have no leaves, you get a clear view from upstairs,’ she added in explanation, reading his mind.

That had been the first thing Valentine had noticed when he’d gone to decorate. That she lived opposite. It had given him quite a shock. He’d stood at her bedroom window to try and see but, being summer, the large oaks had blocked him from making out anything.

‘And one day I realized its owner was you.’

She raised her eyes to meet his.

‘I used to observe you, come rain or shine; when it was fine, I’d see you sitting on the bench in the garden of remembrance. I presumed you were a widower.’

He shifted uncomfortably in his seat. ‘I should’ve said. Explained.’

‘Why? It was none of my business.’ She dismissed the idea, batting away his guilt. ‘Only when you told me about Gisele, I was confused. Still, I didn’t want to say anything. I didn’t want you to think I’d been spying on you.’ She pulled a face. ‘I mean, can you imagine?’

She looked so horrified that he had to smile then, which made her smile too.

‘I looked for a headstone, but I couldn’t see anything,’ she continued. ‘Then one day I noticed the plaque on the bench you always sat on. Saw it was dedicated to Helen . . .’

Her voice trailed off then and her eyes glistened.

‘I’d wondered for a while about Helen – why she never called or visited, no mention of what she was up to . . . I wondered if maybe it was like my sister—’