“I told Josh this morning too. Of course, he’d worked it out for himself after a night spent searching for photographs of Jessica May in the 1940s.”

It was not an explanation, not at all. And there was still the question of the Victorine Hallworth in the photograph. So D’Arcy tried again. “I don’t understand why you would hide it. But there was also, among your war photographs—”

Jess interrupted. “Yes, Josh tells me you know quite a bit about my war work. That you have an interest in it, even. He mentioned a documentary that you wanted to make.”

D’Arcy would kill Josh when she went downstairs. As if Jessica May would have any interest in D’Arcy’s childish attempts at filmmaking. “I can’t make it now,” she said dismissively, as if it didn’t matter. “I didn’t get the fellowship that I wanted. It was a fellowship named after you, actually. Another in a series of very strange coincidences.”

This time, D’Arcy waited for Jess to say something about Victorine: I once knew your mother…But she didn’t. She appraised D’Arcy instead, as if weighing her up, seeing what she was made of. What would she find? Little of substance. Air, whimsy, fluff. All things light and fleeting.

And D’Arcy didn’t know what came over her in that moment, a foolish desire to prove herself, to show Jessica May, photographer extraordinaire, that D’Arcy was worthy of the confidence she’d been gifted. “Can I…can I…” D’Arcy almost clamped her mouth shut—Josh would kill her this time—but out it came. “Can I film you? Even though the fellowship people didn’t think so, I actually can make documentaries; I can give you my résumé if you like. My degree is in art and media; media because of my mother, art because of me. I took every unit in filmmaking that I could at uni and I used to crew on documentaries occasionally and I loved it. I haven’t made a documentary for a very long time but I’d like to make one of you. If you’ll let me.”

D’Arcy expected the woman in front of her to laugh. How preposterous was it that D’Arcy, an amateur, would suggest making a documentary about a woman who would have film crews the world over salivating at the prospect? She’d done no research, no planning, would be extremely limited by the little equipment she had with her for sound and production quality. “I’d love to ask you questions, to tell your story,” D’Arcy finished falteringly. “I bet it’s worth telling.”

“It would mean revealing to the world who I am. I’ve rather liked being someone else for the past sixty years.” Jess turned to face D’Arcy, the expression on her face indecipherable.

D’Arcy almost smacked her palm to her forehead. Why did she speak before thinking through all the issues? All she’d been focused on was the filming and the putting together of a narrative. Not on what would happen to it after she’d finished. “I don’t have to show it to anyone if you’d prefer…” Her voice trailed lamely away. Then she shook her head. “This…” She waved her arm around to signify the chateau and Jess’s work and the larger truth of who Jess was. “And you are extraordinary. Why wouldn’t you want to tell everyone?”