And he did indeed look up, but an old habit for concealment made her step back so he didn’t see her. She heard him come quietly up the stairs and then go on down the passage. There was the sound of a key turning in a lock and a door opening and closing and then silence. Stupid of her to think he might want to see her. She would have loved to talk to him about her proposed search for Luciana’s childhood home – the house that had so lit up the imagination of a lonely little girl in the West Indies all those years ago. She felt instinctively that Christopher would understand and appreciate her romantic folly in looking for this castle-in-the-air and, as so often in the past, she cursed the inbuilt lack of self-confidence that prevented her from making approaches to other people. She would have liked to wish him luck for the following day when the manuscript of his book, which was clearly so important to him, was to be handed to Jonathan Mercer. It’s such a little thing to wish someone luck, thought Marnie. So natural; so easy. Why can’t I do it? Louisa, she felt sure, would have had no such inhibition.

Isobel rang Evelyn Fergusson the following morning. The old lady sounded pleased to hear her, and was enthusiastic about the idea of a small group coming over to see the house and garden the following week, especially when she heard that one of them was a gardening correspondent. They fixed a day and discussed the timing.

‘Oh, and there’s another thing I want to consult you about, Evie,’ said Isobel. ‘I’d like to enlist your help for a young American woman in the group whom you’ll meet. She’s trying to look up old roots and wants to locate a particular house in these parts. I’m not quite sure whether it’s a fortified house or a proper castle – or even if it still exists – but you’ve got such a vast knowledge of historic buildings and such an encyclopedic memory for all the ins and outs of old Scottish families that I thought you’d be just the person for her to talk to. She’s rather unusual, a bit of a one-off. She’s quite reserved until you get to know her, but I think you’ll like her. We do.’

‘Then I’m sure I shall like her too and I’ll certainly do my best to help – but that isn’t what I thought you were going to say. I thought you were going to ask me about something quite different.’

‘Like what?’