‘We should get to bed,’ Rosalind said, as Posy yawned. ‘We can talk in the morning, over breakfast.’

‘We’ve got that panel tomorrow,’ Posy reminded them. ‘The Three Dahlias event. If it even happens. I mean, Clementine’s gone, Marcus is …’

‘Dead,’ Caro finished for her, as she turned towards the stairs. ‘But I think it’ll happen. Too much money at stake and too many people already here. So we’d better meet early. And someone needs to get in touch with Clementine.’

‘Isobel will,’ Rosalind said. ‘She’s good in a crisis.’

‘Is it … is it all over now, do you think?’ Posy asked. ‘I mean, if Marcus or Clementine were behind the blackmail, it could be over. Couldn’t it?’

Caro thought about the photos slipping out of the envelope she’d found in her room. Her own naked form, immortalised on film in a way she’d never agreed to do for money. The humiliation she’d felt at the reminder of it, the realisation that Marcus hadn’t just photographed her, he’d secretly filmed the whole of their ill-advised night together, right after her divorce. The shuddering fear at the idea of a sex tape on the internet, at her age.

Once she’d believed that all publicity was good publicity. Now, it seemed, she’d found her limit.

‘Perhaps,’ Caro lied, realising that Posy was still waiting for an answer to what she’d hoped was a rhetorical question.

If Marcus really hadn’t sent the notes, like he’d claimed – and now he was dead, Caro was more inclined to believe him – that meant that someone still had those photos, that film. Maybe Clementine, maybe not, if Posy was right about the notes being a warning. And until they knew who, it couldn’t be over.

At the bottom of the stairs, the dollhouse was lit by a shaft of moonlight – or maybe a lamp on the porch, shining through the glass either side of the heavy front door. Caro peeked in, and saw another tiny body, lying on the miniature dining table – a copy of the real one they’d just eaten at. Had that been there when she came to dinner? She was almost certain it hadn’t.

She reached in and plucked it out, holding it up to the others. With its round, red face and tiny black jacket, there was no doubt who it was meant to be.

Let the police think this was a heart attack. They knew better.

Blackmail. Theft. Murder. There was so much more going on at Aldermere this weekend than the authorities could even imagine. More than that, Caro’s gut instinct told her they were connected.

And Caro always went with her gut.