A young priest from St Thomas’s said a prayer at the graveside, where the mourners were Lena, Herr Thaller, Herr Gustav, a worker from the wharf who had been on friendly terms with the deceased and two men nobody recognised. From the corner of her eye, as the earth was thrown onto the coffin, Lena kept a watch on the gate in the churchyard wall in case it might swing open to admit a sailor from Trieste.

Then she gazed up to the sky, in which high clouds were moving on the wind, as if there might be a shaft of light, or a voice, to help her make sense of what her mother’s life had signified. There was only the sound of rooks in the top of the trees that ran along the churchyard wall, then the sense of her heart beating rather heavily beneath her thin coat. The priest said his last prayer and crossed himself; the mourners dispersed and the two men no one knew left together, walking in the direction of a street with several bars. Lena watched them go and wondered if they were sharing stories of how they had made love to her mother, paid her money, then clattered down the outer staircase into the night. Or maybe one of them had loved Carina, drunk deep with her and begged her to marry him. Maybe.

At home, there was a letter from the landlord, giving her notice to quit. The lease arrangement, an unorthodox one, had been peculiar to Carina and was not transferable. There was a further letter for her: from Schloss Seeblick, signed by someone called Martha Midwinter, who, Lena thought from the name, might be French, or English.

Dear Lena

I was sorry to hear about the death of your mother. As you know, she worked for the clinic for several years as a cleaner. Some of my colleagues remember looking after you as a baby when she brought you to work.

I wonder if you need work yourself. We are quite a large place these days and always in need of keen and loyal staff. My father, Thomas Midwinter, was one of the founders of the sanatorium and my sister and I were born here. As you may know, we recently moved back from another home, on top of a mountain, the Wilhelmskogel, which had fine views but was quite cold …

Lena didn’t reply at once. She wondered if she should return to work in Herr Thaller’s shop and resume her art classes. But without Rudolf it seemed pointless; and perhaps he had been paying Tomas for her lessons anyway.

One phrase in the letter kept coming back to her: ‘We are quite a large place these days’. Carina had told her little of what went on at the clinic, but she had gained the impression that there were dozens of people working there. She might make friends, she thought, and live a more normal life, with people of her own age.