We had left the last houses behind. Ahead of us was nothing but grassy headland on one side and a rocky shoreline going out to the point on the other. As the road started to climb we got the full force of the wind coming straight at us.

“I’m glad we put the top up or my beret would have been long gone,” I said.

“It’s certainly blustery enough, isn’t it? It’s hard to hold the steering wheel and not get blown over the edge. It’s a wonder Jonquil wasn’t actually blown off the cliff top. I wonder what she was doing there in the first place.”

“It does seem strange,” I replied. “I mean, she had lived in that house all her life. She must have known it would be dangerous to go near the edge of the cliffs.”

“Perhaps something happened down below,” Belinda suggested. “A boat ran aground or she heard a cry for help from someone cut off by the tide. She went to the edge to look over and it gave way.”

“Possible.” I nodded. “How sad for Tony Summers. Only married to her for a year.”

“At least he inherited a large estate,” Belinda pointed out. “Rather convenient when his own family fortunes had waned.”

I glanced at her sharply, wondering what she might be suggesting, but her eyes were focused on the road ahead.

“Ah, here we are,” she said. “And Rose has left the gates open for us. How thoughtful.”

Again I couldn’t tell whether she meant what she was saying or was being sarcastic. We drove through the gates. The drive turned a corner so that it was impossible to see the house ahead of us. Instead it wound into a small wood so that we were passing through another avenue of trees that interlaced above our heads. In the summer it would have been a canopy of green, but at this time of year and with the sort of gales coming from the ocean most of the leaves had already fallen and it was bare branches that were entangled above us while a yellow and brown carpet lay underfoot and covered the driveway. It felt rather strange, like bony fingers reaching out over us and I was glad when we finally emerged from the trees. As we came out of the wood the drive turned again and this time was lined with tall bushes. I’m not exactly an expert on horticulture but I think they were all rhododendrons, of course not flowering right now but they were big enough that they hid any view beyond.