Effie couldn’t blink. Nor breathe. Nor move. She certainly couldn’t speak. She had thought the portrait of him vivid enough but she realized it had poorly served him after all, dishing up only a faint outline of the man standing before her now. His skin was a glowing golden brown, quite unlike her reddish, wind-burnt hue, and his blonde hair shone like spun gold; he looked lit from the inside.

‘Effie.’ The word was a croak.

‘Hello, sir,’ she faltered.

‘Sir?’ Sibyl – Sid? – looked surprised by the deference. Her eyes narrowed, as if she’d been duped. ‘Why, the way you drifted through here, I thought you were a friend!’

It was an opportunity for Sholto to claim she was, but the moment came and went before he even stirred. ‘I . . . I wasn’t . . . expecting you.’ Just like that, his tan had paled.

‘Your father didn’t tell you I was coming?’

‘. . . I haven’t seen him . . . yet . . . What are you . . .?’

Neither one of them looked away. The thick, ancient walls seemed to have dissipated, the exotic cat no longer sitting on a Persian rug in a Scottish country house, the chattering woman sinking into silence . . . It was just the two of them again, as it had been in their last moments together on the island. If we could talk . . . make a plan . . . 

‘Are you quite all right, Sholto?’ Sibyl asked, sitting back in her chair and crossing one leg over the other, swinging her foot. ‘You look like you’ve seen a ghost.’

The woman’s words seemed to jolt him from the trance of shock. He cleared his throat, glancing across at her and running a hand through his hair. Effie didn’t dare move. She couldn’t tell if he was happy to see her or not. He was clearly stunned, but . . .

‘Not a ghost, no,’ he murmured. ‘I’m just a little surprised, that’s all. I didn’t expect to find you in here, much less . . .’ His voice trailed off again and he stared at the floor for a moment.

He inhaled sharply, as if catching himself from falling asleep. ‘Anyway, it’s good to see you again, Miss Gillies. Find us easily enough?’ he asked with the same briskness she’d heard him use with Mathieson once or twice. He stopped before her with a brief nod of his head, seeming taller somehow. He was wearing a black suit with a white shirt and a curious necktie fashioned like a bow. Why was he dressed like that?