‘I love it! The cottage is sorting itself out slowly, and by the summer I might even have a garden for you and Mum to come and sit in.’

‘Sounds wonderful. I really miss a garden, but there’s no space here, of course. Although, when your mother retires, who knows? We might come and join you and live in a seaside bungalow with all the other pensioners. I could start playing whist, your mother could join the WI and learn to knit.’ There was the sound of a key in the door. ‘Ah, here she comes.’

Often with mothers and daughters, there’s a likeness that is noticeable but undefined. In the case of Celestria Hunter and her daughter, no one could have mistaken them for anything else. Jazz had inherited her mother’s height, her fine features and thick auburn hair. At fifty-seven, Celestria was aging well. She looked barely older than she had fifteen years previously.

‘Mum! How are you?’ Jazz stood up and kissed her warmly.

‘She’s stressed and tired out from dealing with an old rogue like me,’ Tom quipped as Celestria walked towards him. ‘Don’t ask if I’ve been doing too much, my angel, we’d only argue if I told you.’

‘We never argue, darling. You do what you want and I let you.’ Celestria massaged Tom’s shoulders, then bent down to kiss the top of his head.

The easy intimacy and obvious adoration between the two of them always touched Jazz. Her mother could be forgiven for being bitter. Her life in the past few years had not been easy, practically, financially or emotionally.

That’s what I want, thought Jazz, for love to be enough.

‘Have you checked the joint, darling?’ Celestria called as she went to hang up her coat.

‘All is ready and waiting,’ replied Tom.

‘Perfect. Then let’s eat.’

‘So, this new case you’re working on? Was it an accident, do you think?’ Celestria and Jazz stood washing the plates.

‘No, now I feel sure that it wasn’t. And this other death just can’t be unrelated, even though it’s now confirmed as a suicide. The coroner called me this morning. A tummy full of sleeping pills, apparently.’

‘Can you tell us who the dead man was?’ Tom, busy putting clean plates away in a cupboard, looked up at Jazz, eyes alight with interest.

‘A tutor at the school. He was an older chap, in his early seventies, and—’

‘Enough of the “old”, sweetheart. I’m in my mid-sixties, so not that far behind, and count myself as a young swinger, naturally.’ Tom smiled. ‘Anyway, pray, continue.’

‘I’ll rephrase that: he was of retirement age. I reckon the school had kept him on as he was a wonderful mentor to the boys. A bit like you, Dad. But I’m struggling to find a link between Charlie Cavendish and Hugh Daneman’s deaths.’

‘Hugh Daneman? The expert on fourteenth-century Latin manuscripts?’

‘Yes, Dad. Why? Do you know him?’

‘Well, I know of him, certainly. He has an excellent reputation in his field. He was at Oxford the same time as I was studying at Cambridge. I had a friend who knew him rather well. I’m pretty sure Hugh Daneman was famous for his wild parties.’