Jenny put her hanky to her mouth and looked in horror at Jazz. ‘How did you . . . Yes! Yes, I did! I did!’ Jenny started to cry in earnest. ‘I wanted my baby to know where he had come from! He was the son of a lord, even if Corin was dead, and his mother just some common scrubber that the Conaughts wanted rid of!’ she sobbed.

‘It’s okay, Jenny, take your time.’

‘I’m sorry, Inspector. You knowing everything has been a bit of a shock, that’s all,’ Jenny nodded. ‘It’s a secret I’ve kept to myself for so long, you see.’

‘I do see, but the trouble is, I don’t know everything. Please don’t think I’m judging you, Jenny. I just need your help to put the pieces of this jigsaw together. And fast. So, if you feel up to continuing, could you tell me what it was that you hid on your baby before he was taken away?’

‘Well, I . . . I gave him a ring, a signet ring, which had the Conaught family crest engraved on it. But I can’t be in trouble for that, can I? I didn’t steal it or nothing.’

‘No, Jenny, I promise, you’re not in trouble. Where on the baby did you hide it?’

‘Well,’ she snuffled, ‘when the nuns left me to hold him for a few minutes just before he was about to be taken, they’d dressed him ready for his new mum and dad to come and collect.’ Jenny smiled. ‘He looked so sweet in his little hat and bootees, and so tiny. He had a nappy on him, under his Babygro, one of those old-fashioned terry towelling ones that no one uses any more. It had a big nappy pin holding it together. It was when I saw that that I had the idea. I took the ring out of my locker, undid the pin and slid the ring onto it. I closed the pin, tucking the ring into the folds of the nappy as best I could, and refastened his Babygro.’ She smiled sadly. ‘I’ve never known to this day whether the nuns found it before the baby was given to his new parents, or whether the new parents saw it, but got rid of it, not wanting anything to remind them their new baby wasn’t theirs by birth.’

Despite herself, Jazz was finding it hard to swallow the lump in her own throat. ‘Well, Jenny, if it’s any consolation, I think it was a lovely thing to do, and I admire you for it. Really I do.’

‘I’d have given anything to keep him.’ Jenny smiled sadly. ‘He was part of Corin. I loved him, you see. Always have, even though he died forty years ago. I think about him, and our little baby, every day of my life.’

Jazz instinctively reached forward and closed her hand over Jenny’s. ‘I can’t imagine how awful it must have been for you.’

Jenny smiled sadly. ‘Yes, it was, but I survived, didn’t I? Just,’ she added. ‘At least I had Hugh. He understood. He loved Corin too. We had that in common, see.’