‘All these rooms are of course available for your use – the card room, billiard room, the library,’ Mayra said, gesturing towards the half-closed doors as they clipped past. ‘The dining hall and drawing room are on the other sides of the courtyard. Señor Mendoza entreats you to use the house as your home.’

They turned into the corridor at the back of the square, a more modest staircase than the one in the great hall, flanked against the wall. Stone pedestals were topped with church candles in hurricane lamps, a tapestry hanging stiffly from a pole. The low curved ceilings swept down to the solid arches of the windows like sheets caught mid-billow, or the vault of a crypt.

‘How old is the house?’ Nathan asked as Mayra led them up the stairs.

‘The oldest parts are eighteenth-century, with new additions in the last hundred years.’

‘It’s very imposing,’ he said. ‘Have you worked here for long?’

‘All my life, professor. I came here as a housemaid and never left.’

‘Worked your way up, huh?’

‘That is correct,’ she nodded, stopping outside a carved, carbonized wood door. ‘Señora Fairfax, this is your room.’

She opened the door wide and stood back to allow Charlotte to enter. It was large but sparsely and simply decorated with whitewashed walls and a tiled floor, a charming yellow toile fabric dressing the bed and the windows. A walled wardrobe stood proud on the left-hand wall and opposite was the black bedstead, an image of the Madonna hanging above it, and on the far side, a door to the en-suite.

‘Uh, it’s beautiful, thank you,’ Charlotte smiled hesitantly. Was the housekeeper aware she wasn’t staying tonight? That she was here simply to drop off the guests of honour? ‘But—’

‘Professor, you are next door,’ Mayra said, leading him onwards. His eyes met hers for a moment as he turned and followed her down the corridor, but Charlotte stood where she was. Curious though she was to see his room too, she couldn’t follow; this wasn’t some jolly trip with friends – ‘Ooh, let me see your room.’ She sank onto the bed and remembered to switch back on her phone. She listened to their voices through the open door, Nathan’s brief but polite murmurings rolling back to her like a ball.

She felt at a loss. What was she doing here? Every minute in his company felt like torture. She couldn’t believe he had lied to her so easily, made her feel so wretched for cheating on Stephen when he – he was the one already married, with a child.

She couldn’t believe he had a child, that he was a father. Over and over on the plane she had tried to imagine it – him, them – but her mind simply wouldn’t allow the image to form and instead she was distracted by the pain in her heart and the sense of panic it brought to her limbs, making her want to flee.