‘Perfectly. Clementine kept good notes, and the volunteers are pretty clued up.’

‘Any luck getting hold of her?’ If they could speak to Clementine, she could answer a lot of the questions that were hanging over them.

But Juliette shook her head. ‘I called, but no answer – I guess the family emergency thing is still ongoing. I left a voicemail, and sent a text, so she’s got my number.’

‘And the volunteers are okay without her or Marcus here?’

‘Yeah, seem to be.’ Juliette smirked. ‘Actually, they’re mostly relieved that it isn’t Marcus bossing them around. He wasn’t the most popular guy around here. Everyone was happier when Clementine was in charge. She knew how things actually worked.’

Caro had suspected as much, but it was nice to have it confirmed by a source on the ground. ‘Marcus always liked to be more of the ringmaster than a performer. Had you met him before? When he’d been to the house?’

A small frown line appeared between Juliette’s perfectly groomed eyebrows as she thought. ‘I don’t think so. I mean, people are here visiting Grandma and Granddad all the time, but I don’t remember him and I think I would.’ She paused, her smile turning a little shy – not something Caro expected from the confident young woman. ‘I wanted to say, thank you for trusting me with this. People … don’t, generally. But Aldermere, Lettice and Dahlia … they’re part of my family legacy too. And it’s nice to be doing something that matters for once.’

Maybe Caro should audition for more Mum roles, after all. It seemed she was good at the teen mentoring thing. Or did that make her more of a cool aunt? There was a definite dearth of cool aunt roles on television at the moment. Perhaps she should write one. She could be writer, director and star of it. That would show Rosalind.

After she finished dealing with a murder.

‘I’m glad you’re enjoying it. I know yesterday wasn’t much fun for you.’ Caro looked both ways before giving Juliette a secretive smile. ‘But did I see you escaping for a least a little bit of fun last night? After you said you were going to call your boyfriend?’

Juliette’s eyes widened. ‘Don’t tell Grandma, will you?’

‘Of course not!’ As if she’d tell Isobel anything. Didn’t Juliette know she was the cool sort of aunt? ‘But just between us girls?’

‘Oliver came here to meet me, by the stables. Grandma basically banned him from Aldermere for the weekend, but he really wanted to see me, so …’ Her cheeks flushed a pretty pink that matched her neck scarf.

‘Young love. I totally understand.’ Well, she mostly remembered, anyway. Suddenly, that ‘have to see you right now’ feeling seemed a long way away. Had she felt like that about Annie, at the start?