But of course it was empty, its immaculate leather seats gazing blankly back at her. Ralph wouldn’t have spent the night in there anyway; she was kidding herself. He’d definitely have come and knocked on the cottage’s green front door, demanding a sofa or – after the shenanigans in the disabled loo – one side of her bed.

Meredith’s head began to spin, her lack of sleep and hangover combining with the disappointment of the empty seat. Not for the first time, she couldn’t help wondering if this whole thing was some kind of weird revenge Ralph was wreaking – perhaps for ‘making’ him unfaithful to Paula? Although she had hardly forced him, she thought. The opposite. And anyway, it would’ve been ridiculously out of character for him to have done that.

If, for some obscure reason, he was just trying to mess with her head, she would find out soon enough – there was a heads of department meeting that morning, which Meredith, as shop manager, and Ralph, as estates manager, were both required to attend. Her gut clenched at the thought of walking into the conference room and seeing his place empty.

She wearily climbed up the backstairs, thinking of Ralph’s hand on her arse on these same steps less than twelve hours earlier.

Ceri’s office was next to Ralph’s, and her door was always open, both literally and figuratively.

‘Morning Ceri,’ Meredith said, entering. Dexter yelped with delight at the sight of her, and she knelt and tousled his brindled head. Ceri was undoing a new box of Minstead House branded ballpoint pens, ready for the meeting.

‘Morning Meredith! Another lovely day, isn’t it!’ She always said this, unless it was pissing down or snowing.

‘Yeah. Anyone else in yet?’

‘Not yet,’ she trilled, a pile of Minstead House notebooks on the desk next to her. ‘Just me, getting ready for the meeting.’ She paused. ‘Strange, though – Ralph’s car’s here. I thought he’d got in early, but there’s no sign of him.’

The HOD meeting was scheduled for 9.45 a.m. in the board room next door. Ceri had already printed and carefully laid out agendas on the vast, polished oval table.

‘He probably got a taxi home last night,’ Meredith said carefully. ‘He wasn’t half putting them away at the staff lunch.’

Ceri would be devastated when she found out that Ralph was dead – if he was – and, Meredith thought with her heart sinking further, probably out of a job too. Whoever eventually replaced Ralph probably wouldn’t be so tolerant about the undelivered phone messages and the unfranked mail. Ceri loved laying stuff out neatly, but wasn’t so hot on the more responsible elements of the position. But she couldn’t lose her job, it would kill her.

Meredith had a feeling that the ripples of yesterday’s events had only just begun to spread.