‘Ah! Amahs spoil us, give in to our childish needs; give us their undivided attention.’

Nikki looked at him, her face still alight. ‘Yes, I guess you’re right.’ She paused and then said, perhaps because it had been on her mind, ‘My mother was very beautiful when she was young. Forces wives had the most wonderful time in those days. More freedom, servants, swimming pools, wonderful places like this for holidays. Attention from the navy when the ships came in. Men, my grandmother told me, outnumbered women even with the single nurses and teachers who came out to work. It was all so different from cold army quarters in England…’

James Mohktar, alerted to something in her voice, waited to see if she was going to say more, and when she did not he said, ‘It is very sad that your happy time as a family was destroyed, Miss Montrose. But it is good that you can still remember those times of happiness.’

Nikki got up. ‘They fade. People too. You have to keep conjuring them up from photographs and memory. You become terrified they will disappear altogether as if they had never lived, their faces a blur…But it is easier here, in Malaysia. Here the images are clearer. My father and my sister feel nearer…’ She trailed off. ‘Sorry. Did you come to tell me something? Inspector Blythe is with my mother in the house.’

‘Yes. I know this.’

They looked at each other. James Mohktar did not want to tell the girl how her sister had died on this dark beach. But something told him he would learn more from her if she was alone rather than with her mother. Together, in that house, the two women managed to create an uneasy atmosphere, and Mohktar wanted to know why.

‘Miss Montrose, come, let us walk back to the house. It is late and I must let the inspector know that I am here.’

‘You came to get me? You have something to tell us?’

‘Yes, but I think it better if I tell you when you are with your mother.’

‘I know you’re going to tell me how my sister died, but, you see, I already know how she died.’

Nikki’s voice was so low that he only just caught her words. Mohktar stopped and looked down at her and quite suddenly he felt chilled. He shivered in the warm night air and wished he had entered the house and not come down to the beach to this strange Englishwoman.

‘What do you mean, Miss Montrose? You cannot know.’

She did not reply for a moment, but turned and looked out to sea. When she turned back to him, she said, ‘Yesterday I went up the cliff path to the forest. I needed to see Saffie’s grave—’

‘Not her grave,’ Mohktar could not help interrupting. ‘It is just the place where she was found. You and your mother will give her a Christian burial and that will be her grave, her resting place.’