‘I love Aidan so much, you’ve got no idea. If that love died, I’d have nothing. But that doesn’t mean it’s unconditional.’ Ruth turned to Charlie, breathing hard in her face. ‘When he told me he’d killed Mary, I . . . I didn’t react well.’

‘Who would?’ said Charlie. Unconditional? Yes. Forgive him? Not a chance, not for any misdemeanour, however small. ‘Loving someone doesn’t have to mean letting them off the hook,’ she said, pleased with her compromise position.

‘Yes, it does,’ Ruth said vehemently. ‘It does, and I don’t think I can do it. I’m scared of the truth, but without it I’ll only torment myself imagining the worst. What if I find out something so terrible it kills my love for Aidan? If that happens, I’ll know for sure that I’m not worth anything, that there’s not enough love in me to forgive or heal anyone. It’ll all be over—everything.’

Charlie almost smiled. If she hung around with this woman for much longer, she might start to think of herself as an irrepressible optimist by comparison.

Ruth closed her eyes, rubbed the back of her neck. ‘You asked me,’ she said in a voice that was barely audible. ‘That’s it. That’s what I’m frightened of.’

Blantyre Lodge’s lounge wasn’t small, but it looked it, overloaded as it was. While Ruth made tea in the kitchen, Charlie started to make an inventory. She wondered how big Ruth’s house in Lincoln had been, if it had housed all this comfortably: books, lamps, mirrors, candles, gardening magazines, six small Persian rugs, more exotic-looking plants than you’d expect to find in a botanical garden’s greenhouse. There was also an ironing board, stepladders, a clothes-drying rack. A small sofa had three throws draped over it and eight embroidered cushions piled on its seat. One was gold and had an image of two green shoes sewn on to it, with a cloth representation of a pink ankle protruding from each one. How peculiar, thought Charlie—the effort that must have gone into the embroidery, and the end result looked as if someone’s legs had been chopped off at the ankles.