Feeling thoroughly unlike herself, she selected a track from Finn’s most recent album and danced round the kitchen.

When the track ended she stopped, breathless, thinking how embarrassed the girls would have been if they could have seen her. They thought she was too old to dance.

And she’d thought her mother was too old to do a road trip.

Behavior shouldn’t be dictated by age, she thought. If she wanted to dance, she’d dance. If her mother wanted to travel, she should travel.

And if she wanted to stay in her home, she should stay in her home.

The doors and windows were open to the garden and Liza could smell the climbing rose that clustered on the wall next to the window. An idea formed in her head, but she pushed it away. Ridiculous. She was stepping into fantasyland.

When she was satisfied that she had dinner preparation well in hand, she headed upstairs to change.

She surveyed her new wardrobe. The problem with so much choice, she thought, was actually choosing.

In the end she settled on the red dress, because she couldn’t imagine another occasion that she might be able to wear it and a dress like this wasn’t designed to live its life hanging on a rail.

Her phone rang as she was heading downstairs.

It was her mother.

“How’s the adventurer?” Liza fastened her watch. She’d started to look forward to these nightly phone calls with her mother. “How are Martha and Josh? Are your matchmaking attempts working?”

“I am hopeful. But I didn’t call to talk about them.”

“Oh?” Liza glanced at the time. She had about half an hour before Finn arrived. “Is everything all right?”

There was a pause. “Liza, I need you to do something for me.”

Her mother never asked anything of her.

Liza sat down hard on one of the kitchen chairs. “Of course.”

“It’s—difficult.”

Physically or emotionally? “Whatever it is, we’ll figure it out.”

“Dear Liza. Always so sensible and reliable.”

Liza studied her sky-high heels. Fortunately this wasn’t a video call, or her mother would see that she’d left sensible and reliable behind in London. “What’s troubling you?”

“There are letters—”

Liza sat up straighter. “The ones in your study?”

“You know about them?”

“I found them when I was searching for the DVDs. They weren’t where you thought they were, so I checked the desk. The letters were with a ring. Which I assume is a fake diamond?”

There was a pause. “It’s not fake.”

Liza went hot and cold.