As Morag pockets her phone and hurriedly throws items into her bag, Jess eyes an untidy pile of medication boxes, stacked on the counter just inside the doorway. ‘Memantine Hydrochloride?’

Morag doesn’t look up. ‘What she’s been prescribed. Diary’s there.’

‘Antipsychs aren’t in the notes.’

‘Hallucinations have come back. She’s feisty when she’s disturbed. Make sure she gets it.’

‘Better light might help her for a start. I mean . . .’ With a nod, Jess indicates the visible gloom.

‘You a doctor? Didn’t fink so. You ain’t even a nurse.’

‘State of this place though.’

‘Do as we’re told. She’s fourth age anyway. You won’t be here long.’

‘Charming. Family?’

‘She ain’t had a single visitor since I been here. Three years and counting. She’s through here. I gotta get on.’

7

Beyond the indiscernible features of the living room, the open French windows at the far end of the large space create a rectangle of intense golden light that appears contained there. Light that frames a glimpse of the rear garden’s wild foliage while failing to illumine much of the room. The dazzle forces Jess to squint and raise a hand to shield her eyes.

Partially eclipsing the glow in the lower half of the French windows sits the black silhouette of a shrunken figure within a wheelchair. Mrs Florence Gardner.

Despite the voices and commotion of the carers who enter the room, the client continues to stare outside, her thinning, unkempt hair a fuzzy halo. As dishevelled as her home, the client is dressed in a shabby velvet leisure suit and old slippers.

Crossing the room and seeing more of the high-ceilinged space, Jess’s bewilderment becomes wonder. Evidence abounds of the cultivated tastes and affluence of a long and privileged life reduced to a dust-filmed museum exhibit. A space overfilled with hardwood furniture and bookcases. The available walls are festooned with oils, line drawings and watercolours. A vast fireplace suggests the door to an unlit tunnel. Before the grate, the dull iron of a barbed fire-poker lies upon a basket of cobwebbed firewood. Next to the French windows, antique dinnerware and silverware glimmer inside the murk of a broad, glass-fronted cabinet.

The only vital feature here is the beautiful garden that lies beyond the room. Jess wanders towards the vista. In such light as falls here she might be admiring a watercolour by Monet.

Her scrutiny is drawn across the lawn to the climax of the visible garden where her vision rests upon a wooded glade, part-glimpsed between columns of trees.