‘Oh, parts of it have been wonderful,’ Anna told her. ‘Meeting people like you and Fraser and Robert and the boys. Spending time in such a beautiful place. But I assume you heard about the run-in with Douglas McKean yesterday?’

‘Give it time, is my advice,’ Emma said. ‘These things don’t happen overnight, and we Scots can find it hard to let anyone in. Especially,’ she said, with a twinkling laugh, ‘an English newcomer.’

As they laughed together the boat’s engine cut out. They both turned towards the wheelhouse, registering a renewed tumult of noise from the two children.

‘Look,’ Fraser said, pointing towards the dolphins. ‘Didn’t you two hear the boys shouting?’

Out in the water the pod had circled on itself and was now leaping towards the boat, dodging waves and the white water broken by the wind. In a moment the animals were alongside, sinuous bodies curling beneath the surface, breaking it, calling with their unmistakable high-pitched whistle. The two boys rushed past them to the other end of the boat. Anna followed, leaning over as the pod billowed past, almost seeming to look up at the humans as much as the humans were looking down at them. The boys stretched out their arms, palms down. A second later Jamie shouted in astonishment as one of the dolphins dove upwards, slapping its nose against his fingers with a wet thwack.

‘See?’ Young Robbie shouted, pointing to the periphery. ‘I told you there was a baby! I told you!’

There, hovering beside its mother, was a little calf, paler than its elders, with inquisitive eyes that followed its inquisitive nose, watching them with eyes far shrewder than one would expect.

They stayed out on the boat late into the afternoon, until the summer sun finally began to dip lower in the sky. By the time they got back to Crovie, Anna was tired again, but smiling as she climbed back down to the harbour. It was strange to be on solid ground after so many hours of the boat’s chop.

‘Thank you for taking me with you,’ she said, to all of them. ‘It’s been a lovely day – and I’m so glad we got to see the dolphin calf!’

‘You should come out with us again,’ Young Robbie called. ‘We’ll be going out to check on it every day until it’s fully grown.’

‘Oh, will we now?’ asked his father. ‘That’s the first I’ve heard of it.’

‘We have to make sure he or she is safe, Dad,’ his son said, with a distinct air of pressed childlike patience. ‘It’s our responsibility.’

‘Right, I see.’ Robert turned back to Anna with a grimace and his hands on his hips. ‘Nothing like making a rod for your own back, is there?’

Anna laughed. ‘Well, I’m always here if you want some company on patrol.’