Antonia said nothing, but in her mind she filed this away as yet another example of Domenica’s taking-over. There had already been several incidents in the plane, when she had monopolised Angus and barely given her a look-in; that was bad enough, but if this were to be the pattern of the trip, then she would have to be dealt with. Angus was not here for the sole delectation of Domenica, thought Antonia, even if it was true that the older woman had met him first. The fact that one has met a person first does not confer any greater right to that person’s company; that would be absurd. Perhaps Domenica needed to be reminded that she, Antonia, was an artist – in that she was a writer – just as Angus was, and that this meant that there was a bond between the two of them to which Domenica, as a non-artist, could not hope to aspire.

‘I feel so … so exhilarated,’ she said. ‘Just to be here in Tuscany.’ She gestured to the countryside outside the car. ‘What artistic soul could be anything but quickened in such a place? Don’t you agree, Angus? As an artist?’

Angus smiled. ‘Indeed,’ he said. ‘This is landscape to which one can hardly be indifferent.’

Antonia now continued. ‘I suppose that even those of us who are not artists,’ and here she looked pointedly at Domenica, ‘must feel something too. Not as intensely, perhaps.’

Domenica kept her eyes fixed on the road. ‘We have a long family association with this part of Italy,’ she said evenly. ‘My parents, in fact, met in Florence. My father, you see, was instrumental in setting up the British Library there. He was with the British Council for many years. They had many friends here. And I came for the holidays – quite often, in fact. My very first boyfriend was Italian, you know. I was sixteen and there was this delightful boy whose father was the Conte di something or other, and we played tennis—’

‘Such a dull game,’ interjected Antonia. She did not want to hear about this Italian boy and his father, the conte; a typical story, she felt, of upper-middle-class pretension. And what was this about visiting as a child? She thought that Domenica had lived in India when she was young, not Italy. Was she making the whole thing up?

‘Tennis?’ said Angus. ‘Tennis dull? Surely not. I’ll play tennis with you, if you like, Domenica. I’m a bit rusty, but I used to play quite a lot. Do we have a tennis court at the villa, I wonder?’

‘I don’t think so,’ said Domenica. ‘But had we had one then we should certainly have played.’