It was one-thirty, six hours after the finding of the body, but for Dean and Kimberley Bostock, waiting in the kitchen until someone arrived to tell them what to do, the morning seemed unending. This was their domain, the place where they were at home, in control, never harassed, knowing that they were valued even if the words weren’t often spoken, confident in their professional skills and, above all, together. But now they drifted from table to stove like disorganised amateurs abandoned in an unfamiliar and intimidating environment. Like automata they had slipped the cords of their cooks’ aprons over their heads and put on their white caps, but little work had been done. At half past nine, at Miss Cressett’s request, Dean had taken croissants, jam and marmalade and a large jug of coffee into the library, but, removing the plates later, found that little had been eaten, although the coffee jug was empty and the demand for it seemed unending. Sister Holland regularly appeared to bear off another thermos. Dean was beginning to feel that he was imprisoned in his own kitchen.

They could sense that the house was locked in an eerie silence. Even the wind had dropped, its dying gusts like despairing sighs. Kim was ashamed of her faint. Mr. Chandler-Powell had been very kind to her and had said that she wasn’t to return to work until she felt ready, but she was glad to be back where she belonged, with Dean in the kitchen. Mr. Chandler-Powell had been grey-faced and looked much older and somehow different. He reminded Kim of how her dad had looked when he came home after his operation, as if strength and something more vital than strength, something that made him uniquely her dad, had drained out of him. Everyone had been kind to her, but she felt that the sympathy had been carefully voiced, as if any words could be dangerous. If a murder had happened at home in her village, how different it would have been. The cries of outrage and horror, the comforting arms round her, the whole street pouring into the house to see, hear and lament, a jumble of voices questioning and speculating. The people at the Manor weren’t like that. Mr. Chandler-Powell, Mr. Westhall and his sister and Miss Cressett didn’t show their feelings, at least not in public. They must have feelings; everyone did. Kim knew she cried too easily, but surely they cried sometimes, although it seemed an indecent assumption even to imagine it. Sister Holland’s eyes had been red and swollen. Perhaps she had cried. Was it because she had lost a patient? But didn’t nurses get used to that? She wished she knew what was happening outside the kitchen, which, despite its size, had become claustrophobic.