When Anna had first come up with the idea of the Fibre Workshops she’d considered asking Evelyn to come into partnership with her. She’d thought it would be good to have one of the Whalsay women on her side and Evelyn’s background, her voice and her stories would bring an authentic flavour to the enterprise. But in the end Anna hadn’t wanted to share control of the project with anyone. Evelyn had been disappointed, Anna had been able to tell that, but she’d still been generous in her support. She’d let Anna use her knitting patterns and copy her recipes for the dye. Evelyn had even tried to raise some funds for the business from the Shetland Islands Council. That hadn’t worked out in the end – money was a lot tighter than it used to be, Evelyn said – but it had been kind of her to try.

Anna didn’t discuss any of this with Jane: she didn’t think the woman would understand that she preferred to work on her own. But at the end of the afternoon they exchanged email addresses and promised to keep in touch.

When she got home Anna felt almost elated and over supper she talked about the meeting to Ronald.

‘That’s good,’ he said. ‘I’m glad you had a fine afternoon.’ But she sensed he was preoccupied with his own thoughts. He wasn’t listening to her at all.

‘What is it?’ she asked. ‘Something I can help with?’

He shook his head without speaking.

She felt another little stab of impatience. Why wasn’t he stronger and more decisive? She could forgive him almost everything except his weakness.

On the morning of the funeral she dressed carefully. As soon as she got up she took her dress from its plastic wrapper and laid Ronald’s suit on the bed. He’d disappeared early to the big house after another summons from Jackie. She went to have a bath and saw the suit was still there when she came back to the bedroom. Sitting in front of her dressing-table mirror to fix her make-up, she could see its reflection, reminding her that Ronald was still not home. Soon the neighbour who had offered to mind James would be here. Anna thought it would be embarrassing if Ronald hadn’t appeared before the woman arrived.