They moved into the garden, Candace striding out ahead. Lettie, although usually as energetic as her companion, felt as if she were being dragged behind like a dilatory encumbrance. They searched both cottage gardens and the wooden sheds at the end of each. The one at Rose Cottage held a miscellany of dirty tools, implements, some rusty, broken flowerpots and swathes of raffia thrown together on a shelf with no attempt at organisation; the door was partly jammed with an old lawnmower and a net sack of wood kindling. Candace closed the door without comment. In contrast the shed at Stone Cottage was a model of logical and impressive tidiness. Spades, forks and hoses, their metal gleaming, were ranged on one wall, while the shelves held flowerpots arranged in order and the lawnmower was clean of any trace of its function. There was a comfortable wicker chair with a checked cushion, obviously well used. The contrast between the state of the two sheds was reflected in the gardens. Mog was responsible for the garden at Rose Cottage, but his interest was in the Manor gardens, particularly the knot garden, of which he was jealously proud and which he trimmed with obsessive care. He did little more at Rose Cottage than was necessary to avoid criticism. The Stone Cottage garden showed evidence of expert and regular attention. Dead leaves had been swept up and added to the wooden box which held the compost heap, shrubs pruned, the earth dug and tender plants shrouded against frost. Remembering the wicker chair with its indented cushion, Lettie felt a surge of pity and irritation. So this hermetic shack, the air of which felt warm even in winter, was a refuge as well as a utilitarian garden shed. Here Candace could hope to snatch an occasional half-hour of peace from the antiseptic odour of the sickroom, could escape to the garden in short periods of freedom when it would have been more difficult to find time for her other known passion, swimming from one of her favourite coves or beaches.

Candace closed the door on the smell of warm wood and earth without comment and they made their way to Stone Cottage. Although it was not yet noon, the day was gloomy and dark and Candace switched on a light. Lettie had been in Stone Cottage several times since Professor Westhall’s death, always on the business of the Manor and never with pleasure. She was not superstitious. Her faith, maverick and undogmatic as she knew it to be, had no place for disembodied souls revisiting the rooms in which they had unfinished business or had last drawn breath. But she was sensitive to atmosphere and Stone Cottage still provoked in her an unease, a lowering of the spirit, as if accumulated unhappiness had infected the air.