Later that night, Irene climbed out of bed. It was very cold, very quiet. Adrian was asleep downstairs on the fold-out sofa, still dressed, an old blanket thrown over him and his feet in the socks that Father Christmas had given him sticking out at the end. His mobile was on the floor beside him. She picked it up and strode, barefooted, out of the house, into the blue moonlight. The grass was cold and damp, the sky clear. She crossed the lane and made her way onto the beach. The tide was up, dark waves sucking at the grit and sand, spitting out broken shells. She stood ankle deep in the foam and hurled the phone far out to sea, watching it turn in the air then splash into the swelling black water. She imagined it sinking to the bottom, a box full of secrets and lies, and being washed empty there till it was just another bit of salt-crusted plastic bobbing along on the dirty ocean floor.

Then she returned to the house, picked up her bow, tightened it, rubbed rosin up and down its length. She lifted her violin out of its green-lined case. At least she knew now. That was something.

She went into the conservatory and opened the door so the waves were louder and the wind licked at her bare legs. Wet feet slightly apart, back straight, the fingers of her right hand curved around the bow, the fingers of her left curled across the neck of the violin, which she tucked under her chin. She imagined herself on a stage. She pressed the heel of the bow onto the D string, and drew it along the entire length, feeling it grip and draw the music out. A perfect note. Something like excitement bubbled in her chest; something like a howl.

They returned to London the following day – a tense, polite journey, full of I-spy and talking tapes and ghastly silences – and when she unlocked the front door and was hit by the musty smell of absence, she knew that she had to talk to someone about it. If she didn’t talk she would go mad with the rising clamour inside her.