“I don’t think so.” It’s a beautiful day, breath-stealingly cold but bright and clear; the kind of day where one can see so very far that the curve of the earth is evident and it seems ludicrous that anyone ever thought the world was flat.

“It’s weird not to see trails in the sky,” Carrie muses. “Everyone was talking about it at the funeral.”

I tense a little. Is bringing up the funeral another veiled rebuke? “I suppose I wasn’t the only one whose travel got scuppered by the volcano.”

“There were a lot of condolence cards from abroad.” I sense rather than see her shrug as I’m concentrating on the road again. “But I don’t know if those people would have come anyway. I didn’t really know who most of them were. Dad said they were from the art world. Or from before she had me. One guy made it. From Denmark, I think. Or maybe the Netherlands—he got a ferry. Dad said he was a big collector, pretty much launched Mum’s career. He said you might remember him.” I can feel Carrie’s gaze on me. “A big guy. Like a rugby player build.”

I rack my brains as much as I can whilst keeping the car on the road. “It doesn’t ring any bells.” Or rather, it rings too many: to an eight-year-old, every man is tall. “What was his name?”

“I don’t remember. I’ll have to ask Dad. Anyway, he talked about her a little—Mum, I mean. The way she painted, staying up all night to finish pieces . . . It didn’t sound like her at all.”

“Well, Pete was a civilizing influence, I guess. She was different before.”

“Before your dad disappeared?”

I shake my head. “I don’t remember her much from then.” Only that bright, shining garden image that surely isn’t a memory at all; it’s too distinct. Some memories of my father in the Manse have been returning, but they’re all tactile: the feel of crawling into bed to cuddle into him, the weight of the kiss he dropped on my head as I ate my cereal. My mother wasn’t the tactile type. “The guy from Denmark was right, whoever he was. I have plenty of memories of her staying up all night painting. Her coping mechanism, I guess. Or her escape . . .” That’s a Karen, and a period of time, that I do remember. Chaotic, shambolic years . . . She was angry back then, tight-lipped and hard-eyed with rage. Presumably there was grief in there, too, but I was too wrapped up in my own loss to appreciate hers.

“You’ve never told me anything about that time.” Carrie has unbuckled her seat belt and turned toward me in her seat, her gray eyes settled upon me.