“Decluttering the attic, food shopping. Welcome to my glamorous life.” I pause for a moment, considering whether to offer to take her to the station, and then mentally slap myself for my petty reluctance. “I’ll pull on some clothes and give you a lift to the station, though, if you want.”

“Really? That would be great.” She tosses a grateful smile to me, and is about to speak when her phone, lying faceup on the checked table cover, begins to chirrup insistently. I see her eye the screen for the caller ID, and grimace. “Sorry, I have to get this.” She pushes back her chair and picks up the phone, and as she does, I see that odd movement of her shoulders again: not a shrug exactly, it’s not pronounced enough. It’s more of a wriggle, or a slight shimmy. “Graham!” she exclaims into the phone, a wide smile fixed in place. “How lovely to hear from you.” She’s leaving the kitchen now, but her words float behind her. “Of course I’m up. I’ve got rehearsals to get to . . . Yes, that’s right, Edinburgh . . .” I look around the now-empty kitchen, with Carrie’s bowl abandoned on the table. She’s left the cereal cupboard door open; I noticed that she did the same yesterday. Jonathan would hate living with her. I close the cupboard door and take myself upstairs, still surprised by how perky Carrie is this morning. Certainly she’s a far cry from the woman who was desperately in need of a caffeine infusion two mornings ago. She’s even exiting her own bedroom, coat on and bag at the ready, when I emerge from my own, a mere ten minutes later.

“Look,” she says. “I must have missed this one.” She’s holding something in her hand, balanced on her flat palm. It takes a minute for my eyes to adjust to the relative darkness of the hallway after my bright bedroom; I can’t immediately identify what it is. And when I do, I feel my stomach wrench and knot.

“Where did you get that?” I bark, staring at the ashtray in her hand. There are six or seven butts in it.

“On the windowsill of my bedroom.”

“Your bedroom . . . What, the outside sill?”

“Yes, like the other one. I must have overlooked it.” She cocks her head and then sighs. “Ailsa, don’t be building this up into something it’s not. I just overlooked it the other day.” There’s no judgment in her tone, no accusation in her eyes, but all the same, I know it must be there. I can feel the stiffness in my face. She sighs again. “If there was anybody out there having a tab, he or she would have to be BFG-sized to put an ashtray on my windowsill.”

“Or be inside, not outside.”

“But you locked the doors last night, right?”

I nod.

“Well, then.”