Next were the cupboards and drawers, all of which had already been emptied but definitely needed a refresh. Then the fridge, which did not smell nearly as awful as Anna had been expecting, then the little pine ‘dining table’.

By the time Anna was finished in her quest to clean the kitchen, she was tired, hot and, despite the huge breakfast she’d had courtesy of Frank and Pat, hungry again. Her clothes, towels, most of her toiletries and all of her kitchen equipment were still in the car. Anna realized now that she was going to be here for at least one more night, so she may as well bring more of her belongings into the Fishergirl’s Luck, if only so that she didn’t have to keep returning to the car every time she needed something.

The village was still quiet as she walked back through it again, for which Anna was grateful given the sweaty mess she had become in her quest to clean. When she reached the old Fiat she saw that something had been pushed beneath one of her window wipers, a square of white paper that fluttered in the breeze blowing off the North Sea. Anna pulled out a note and saw that someone had scrawled on it in untidy letters that matched a brief, unfriendly message.

Parking is for RESIDENTS

Anna looked around as she held the note in her hand, but there was no sign of anyone who might have left it there. If she’d had to guess she would have said it was the work of Douglas McKean, but he already knew that she owned the Fishergirl’s Luck, so where would be the sense in leaving a note like this? She scrunched it up in her hand and then shoved it into her pocket, but the note’s advent left an unpleasant feeling lurking in her gut.

Don’t worry, she said silently to whomever might be watching and wishing her gone. I won’t be here long.

This time she used the barrow to cart her boxes along the seafront. She passed a couple of people, who nodded and said hello, suggesting that neither of them were responsible for the note, but then, who ever really knew what was going through someone else’s head?

Anna gave the miniature bathroom a wipe down, and then tried the shower. The water was mercifully hot, the pressure not bad. She came out of it feeling refreshed, and pulled on a pair of sweatpants, a sweatshirt and the comfy boot slippers that Geoff had always condemned as ratty and cheap-looking.

When she stepped out of the bathroom, Anna was caught by surprise at how good the kitchen looked in its newly clean state.