“I’ll find my way. Don’t fuss! And I can make packed lunches!”

“Yes, please,” came a little voice by her side. “I like Nutella sandwiches.”

Sofia gave a loud, strangulated laugh before casting a worried glance at Skylar, who was cross-legged on the rug, meditating quite obtrusively. “Ha, as if we would ever have Nutella in the house.”

“I had it at a party once,” said Phoebe in a wistful tone, as if describing a paradise lost. “I will never forget it.”

Carmen wondered if buying them all enormous jars would do as Christmas presents.

“No, don’t worry about it,” said Sofia. “I do them all on Sunday nights and take them out of the freezer as we go.”

“What is it today?” said Phoebe.

“Hummus and radishes!” said Sofia. “Isn’t that amazing? I’ve made it into a happy face for you in your lunch box.”

“Radishes don’t make anyone happy,” said Phoebe.

“I love radishes, Mummy!” said Pippa, appearing in the kitchen doorway, somehow already in her blue school uniform and neat tartan kilt; she looked immaculate, ironed, put together, her shiny hair shimmering in a neat ponytail.

Sofia smiled at her. “Well, good for you,” she said. “Would you like some extra raisins?”

“Oh yes, please!”

“‘Oh yes, please,’” mimicked Phoebe. “Oh please, please, I would like more stupid raisins because I am stupid Pippa.”

Carmen headed for the door, just in time to hear Sofia admonishing Phoebe for her rudeness.

“And wish Auntie Carmen good luck on her first day in her new job.”

“Good luck, Auntie Carmen!” sung out Pippa.

Phoebe frowned. “I hope the other people are nice to you,” she said in a tone of voice that made clear she didn’t expect that ever to be necessarily the case.

“Thanks,” said Carmen, who was rather worried about that herself.

SOFIA WASN’T WRONG about her up-and-down-steps theory. She had insisted Carmen take Princes Street. There was another way, but it involved upper streets and lower streets and, without wanting to be insulting, she said she wasn’t sure Carmen was quite ready to take that in. Carmen had agreed with her.

So instead, she walked along the main road of the capital. One side was lined with the usual big-city shops and brands, but on the other, ridiculously, was a set of formally laid out gardens with bandstands and fountains. These ended abruptly at the foot of a cliff, which rose hundreds of feet in the air, an ancient gray castle perched on the top of it as if in a different realm altogether. This was a city in the lowering gray cloud, busy with its own affairs in the sky.

At the foot of the cliff were the formal gardens, and running through the gardens, as if to make things even more ridiculous, ran several railway lines clogged with locomotives, like a giant’s train set.