‘I had a faint signal just now.’ Lucas was moving his phone around like a compass, tipping it at different angles. ‘This bloody place.’

Esther left the chair to close the curtains, summoning patience. ‘Dylan says the connection is always dodgy, even without blizzard conditions. Remember, Lily told us? Apparently, you can always get through from the top of the hill, although that’s not really an option now.’ It was Heidi Lucas wanted to speak to, of course. His fervour at the services the day before had been plain, eyes boring at the little screen, thumbs flying. Hats off to Heidi, Esther reflected dryly, for clearly being confident enough to keep him on his toes. More confident than she had ever managed, anyway. She paused at the window, the edges of which were so caked in snow that the darkness outside resembled a black porthole.

‘It’s just one day, Lucas,’ she murmured. ‘And Dylan has clearly… thrived.’ She chose the word carefully, bracing herself. It hadn’t been what she had expected either. When Lucas remained silent, she picked up the hearth poker, her thoughts flicking to her own father as she prodded the molten embers. Everything, everywhere seemed to have turned upside down; almost as if the truth was being shaken out of them all. It was terrible, but also – somehow – good. ‘Boxing Day at the latest, and we’ll be gone,’ she told Lucas, because he had abandoned his mobile at last and was looking so wretched, ‘with the help of ten farmers if necessary.’

‘Twenty.’

With John upstairs, getting through the evening hadn’t proved so bad. He was giving them time together, Dylan had reported proudly, after returning with a rejected plate of salmon and various salads, all of it so delicious that Esther had to rein in the urge to remark on the fact after every mouthful. That his grandfather was almost certainly seeking sustenance of another kind crossed her mind, and Lucas’s too, she knew, grateful that even in his distracted state he recognised it wasn’t the moment to say so. There was a way to go yet. They had to pace themselves, keep the peace.

‘We’ll go tomorrow if the weather clears,’ Lucas announced during the course of a somewhat awkward parting at the bottom of the stairs, he and Esther dodging each other in order to embrace the children. They each murmured their final goodnights, without her, or either child, contradicting him.