‘Me too.’ It was very swish, the new website, elegant and modern, with lots of artistic photographs of the interiors. ‘So they don’t know about the shoe then? Or the marks in the attic?’ They reached the street and turned up towards the beach, Flossie leading the way. ‘The owners, whoever they are.’

‘I don’t think so. It’s the sort of thing they like to feature isn’t it?’ said Kym. ‘Something spooky to give the tourists a thrill. And they never set foot in the place once they started work on it.’

‘How do you know that?’

Kym shrugged, ‘I used to talk to the builders a bit, if I happened to be passing.’

‘Oh.’ Evie, completely at a loss as how to deal with the appreciative looks and occasional comments that had characterised most of her encounters with the workmen, had done her best to ignore them. After a while they’d got the message. ‘Did they notice anything? Anything – weird?’

‘I don’t know.’ Kym looked oddly guilty. ‘I was just getting somewhere when my gran had a quiet word and after that, they wouldn’t give me the time of day. She can be a bit – over-protective.’

The street narrowed and they were too close, Kym’s wrist brushing against Evie’s hip; she stepped into the road. Flossie’s claws scraped over the cobbles. ‘And everything settled down last night? Once I was gone?’ she asked.

‘Yeah. All quiet. Maude didn’t say anything when Nell got back; I don’t think she will.’

They headed towards the pier, it was low tide and the beach was empty.

‘So no one knows about the marks except us.’

‘Doesn’t look like it.’

Flossie picked up her pace as they walked down the steps onto the beach. Evie bent down and let the dog off her lead; Flossie gave a sharp bark and ran across the sand.

‘So, I did a bit of a search on the internet,’ said Kym, pulling her phone out of her pocket. ‘What do you reckon?’

The photos on the screen weren’t that helpful – glossy close-ups that gave no sense of scale, no context – but there were diagrams too, hand drawn and labelled, and much easier to digest. There were some circular designs that were bold and simple, almost childlike in their execution, and others that were astonishing in their complexity.

‘They look – similar,’ Evie said, surrendering the phone.

‘Here.’ Kym flicked through the screen again. ‘“Marian marks”,’ she read out loud, ‘“referring to the Virgin Mary and widely assumed to offer protection”.’ She glanced up, ‘Those are the letters.’

‘M,’ said Evie. ‘M for Mary.’