‘I loved her too,’ he said. Like a second mother. But Verity just stared at him more aghast. The kitchen door slammed behind him.

Outside, the cold air blasted his face. The sun hadn’t yet risen and a low mist clung to the ground.

‘There you are,’ said Peter. ‘Bloody glad you made it. Here, drink some of this.’ He whacked Arthur on the back and handed him a tiny glass of something viscous and amber-coloured. Arthur downed the drink, the sweetness sliding into his throat. ‘Nice little sherry,’ said Peter. ‘A fine pre-hunt tradition.’ He seemed slightly drunk already, as if he was drowning out some frustration. He’d been increasingly reckless and maudlin since the awful trip to Norwich.

‘Any chance of another?’ Arthur asked. ‘It’ll shake off the cold.’

Peter filled up his glass and helped himself to another one too.

‘No Jack?’ Arthur said.

Peter’s forehead creased in a frown. ‘He was going to come but no sign so far. Probably something at the base.’ He knocked back his sherry. ‘Though I’m surprised he didn’t come to see her.’ He jerked his head to the house.

‘Why would he?’ Arthur said, his heart thumping painfully.

Peter rolled his eyes. Then he looked quizzically at Arthur. ‘Come on, let’s leave them to it and catch the beast.’

By the time they began to ride, Arthur was pleasingly drunk from three sherries in quick succession on an empty stomach. And Jack had not turned up. He was glad to be gone from the farmhouse, away from the awfulness of what he’d said. ‘Don’t let Ver see the body,’ Peter had hissed urgently into his ear as Arthur had run down to the beach. He understood why when he saw her body. Mrs Frost was lying on the beach barely sheathed in a grey silk nightdress.

When they caught the fox, on a slight incline miles away from Howe Farm, the sun was rising behind them over the sea. Arthur held back at first, his hands stroking the horse’s flank. But he couldn’t keep away. He edged forward, a horrible curiosity propelling him. The animal was in the throes of death, clamped in the jaws of two hounds. A gash in its neck was open and bloody, the blood clotting its thick red fur. Its teeth were bared, black lips pulled back in a clown-like frown but its eyes were not yet dead. They shone, amber-coloured, jewel-like, gazing at him. He felt in his body a shiver of cold, and yet his hands, when he removed his gloves, were covered in a film of sweat.