She was acutely jealous of Idra, who had gotten a job in a restaurant and was absolutely loving being busy and pocketing tips for doing essentially the same job as she had before, only this time with ice cream. As Christmas drew closer, she was doing better and better and could not believe she’d wasted so many years attempting to tell people that fascinators suited them. “Fascinators don’t suit anyone,” she’d pointed out more than once. “They would make Gigi Hadid look ridiculous. It’s a stick with nets! It costs £59.99. It’s fuchsia! It doesn’t keep your head warm or cold! It doesn’t stay on very well! And, let me just remind you, it doesn’t suit you.”

“Oh God. Can’t you come home?”

“Back to Mum and Dad’s house while they pretend that I’m not a total failure? Walk out on my pregnant sister?”

“Sucks to be you.”

“Thanks!”

She stared outside the window. There were hordes of people walking up and down the beautiful, curved street, rich-looking tourists with money and time to spend. She sighed and looked around. The whole thing would need . . . I mean, God, what would she even do? She didn’t know how to run a bookshop; she knew how to display ribbon nicely and how to cut velvet without losing an inch and how to convert metric to imperial and back again in her head in a heartbeat.

She picked up the nearest book. It was one of a set of Charles Dickens, a very old edition in properly bound leather. She sighed and leafed through all of them, wondering where she could find a cloth to wipe the dust off them. She found A Christmas Carol and put it, facing outward, in the window. Then she WhatsApped Idra again.

“Got any restaurant jobs going? I have NO idea what I’m doing.”

There was no reply. Then, half an hour later, her phone rang.

“Hey!”

“Hey yourself! I’m on my break.”

“I think this might be all break,” said Carmen, looking around. “Hang on, does the restaurant need someone?”

“Sorry,” said Idra. “They’ve got me.”

“Oh, yes.” Carmen sighed.

“But I had an idea and it’s hilarious.”

“You mean terrible.”

Idra giggled in a way that insinuated that was exactly what she meant. “You’re not the only person in the world who has moved to Edinburgh, you know.”

Carmen frowned. “What do you mean?”

“My spies have it that someone has been spotted barging in and out of Jenner’s”—Jenner’s was the ancient department store that still graced Princes Street—“sniffing loudly and complaining about dust on the banisters and footfall.”

“You are kidding,” said Carmen.

“None other,” said Idra. “Apparently she’s moved to live with her sister.”

“Like me! Oh my God, I’m Mrs. Marsh! Oh God!” said Carmen. Then: “Hang on. What happened to Mr. Marsh?”

“Aha! It gets even more complex.”