Maren flapped her hands, flustered by not being able to access the correct English term. ‘Perhaps this is why you didn’t fill it in?’ she said. ‘You mistook it for something else. Only I had expected to find it full of photographs of Gaia’s progress. Her writing samples, reading log and so on.’

‘Could you show me the log book?’ I asked gently. She nodded and turned on her heel towards the playroom. I followed, my heart leaping about in terror like a caffeinated frog, and watched as she rooted in a drawer for the log book. When a few minutes passed with no sign of the book, I said: ‘Isn’t it there?’

She looked flustered now, her sleeves rolled up and her lips pursed. ‘Perhaps it is in the office,’ she said. ‘I will check.’

‘Was there anything else?’ I said sweetly.

She smoothed a strand of blonde hair back into place. ‘Yes, there was, as it happens,’ she said. ‘I wanted to ask about your cooking. You recall I expressly stated that Tom wishes the girls to be raised vegan.’

‘I’ve been making vegan meals.’

I had been meticulous about checking out the food stores. There wasn’t exactly a Tesco around the corner, and Maren had mentioned she went shopping once a month, but happily the huge chest freezer was well stocked with frozen vegetables, bread, cakes, yoghurts, and vegan mince, chicken and even bacon (soya-based stuff that tasted pretty decent). In the larder sat row upon row of hand-labelled jars of jams, nut butter, preserved fruits, cartons of almond milk, and along the floor sat great sacks of dried rice, pulses, flour, potatoes, and a thousand different kinds of dried beans. We certainly wouldn’t starve.

Maren sighed, and again I felt my cheeks flush and my heart stammer, as if I’d done something terribly wrong.

‘Is there something you’re not telling me, Sophie?’ she said then.

I lifted my gaze to her searching blue eyes. It was hanging in the air, her suspicion of me, her eyes perceiving every inch of my terrible lie as though it was smeared ten inches thick across my face.

‘I’m not vegan,’ I heard myself say. ‘I’ve … renounced veganism.’

Her eyebrows shot up.

‘I’m not convinced veganism is … nutritionally adequate,’ I continued, or rather my mouth continued. ‘Studies have shown …’

I’m glad Maren cut in then, one hand held up as if to say she’d heard all about ‘studies’, because I had no idea what kind of studies I was about to refer to. ‘Yes, yes,’ she said. ‘And frankly, I agree. But Tom has … Look, I don’t mind if you give the girls honey.’