Saffy rubs her eyes. ‘I’m shattered. I’ve been at my desk for eight hours straight with just one break.’

Lorna feels a punch of concern. ‘You have to take it easy . . .’

‘How can I?’ she wails. ‘This has all been such a distraction! I’m behind. I can’t afford to get sacked.’

Lorna presses her lips together, not wanting to say anything to annoy her daughter. Saffy was always so even-tempered. Lorna knows this must all be getting to her, not to mention the hormones flying around.

‘I can’t stop thinking about what the police said yesterday,’ says Saffy, with a sigh. ‘About the body not being Jean Burdon.’

‘It could still be Daphne. Perhaps your gran got it wrong when she said Daphne was really Jean. Or Daphne lied to her.’

‘But that file of Sheila’s. It had a report about Jean Burdon in it, written by Neil Lewisham. That’s a link. And Dad rang earlier to say someone at his newspaper deciphered the shorthand and it was notes about Jean and Sheila being one and the same.’

‘The police will figure it out,’ says Lorna. Her stomach rumbles as the smell of the casserole fills the cottage. ‘We need to have faith in them. In DS Barnes.’

Saffy sighs. ‘As soon as the police do figure it out, the journalists will be back with a vengeance, like wasps. I know they’re only doing a job, but this is our life.’

‘I know.’ Over the last few days they have lost interest, but Lorna has been keeping Euan updated by text, and he warned her that it’s often the way. And then a new piece of information will come to light and the journalists will be back.

They hear the front door bang and Lorna notices how Saffy stiffens. Then Tom pokes his head around the living-room door. ‘Something smells good.’

‘You’re home early,’ cries Saffy, happily, and Lorna feels a stab of envy at how she runs to him and he wraps her in his arms. It used to be her she ran to as a kid, when it wasn’t her gran. Now it’s Tom. He’s still wearing his helmet. It’s white and looks like an egg. He removes it and shakes out his hair. It’s slightly damp.

‘I’m starving,’ he says, throwing his helmet onto the chair. Lorna fights the urge to pick it up and hang it on the peg in the hallway.

‘Only another half an hour –’ She’s interrupted by a rap on the door. Tom goes to the window and peers out. It’s still light outside, the sun just starting to descend behind the trees, the kind of evening Lorna loves, where the heat of the day still lingers. ‘It’s an old woman with a young guy,’ he says.