She picked at the bedspread and lowered her voice. ‘It wasn’t just the staff. Evangeline and Miss Gillies took to teasing Morvern too, calling her hither and thither, giving her ridiculous tasks that were made to humiliate her. I don’t think they really meant harm. They took their lead from the servants, but it was unkind.’ She paused for a beat. ‘Greer was not like her mother. Where Morvern was slow, Greer was sharp, even at six – she saw it all and she understood it.’ Mrs Lenister put out a stubby finger and wiped a piece of soot from her sleeve. ‘She had a bad time of it, miss. It won’t hurt you to be kinder to her, to forgive Greer for some of her ways.’

I recalled the glimpses of intimacy that I had witnessed between Greer and Miss Gillies. Surely Greer would have detested a person who had contributed to her mother’s death. ‘So Greer must have hated them – hated the sisters.’

Mrs Lenister put her head to one side. ‘It was complicated. Although they teased Morvern, they made rather a pet of Greer. The girls were nearly grown then at sixteen and seventeen.’

‘So Greer did not resent them for their treatment of Morvern?’

‘Well now.’ She shifted on her seat. ‘I did not say that. Greer is a complicated creature. She spent much of her time up in the nursery where they had their toys. She was small for her age and had a quietness about her, and often I would come across her without having noticed she was there, if you get my meaning.’ She frowned. There was a pause and I felt her pull back from her confidence.

‘What happened? Mrs Lenister?’

‘There came a difficult time,’ she said slowly. ‘The sisters began to quarrel between themselves. It became very unpleasant – accusations and unkindnesses. It got rather out of hand. And then there was the terrible accident.’

I sat up, barely feeling the pain in my hip. ‘You mean Morvern?’

‘No, I mean when Miss Gillies had her accident, the burn.’

‘Oh.’ I sank back against the pillows and my thoughts returned to that very first day when Miss Gillies had positioned herself so that I would see only her unmarred cheek and build from that the template of her good looks.

‘And then, Mrs Lenister?’

‘Let me tell you all. After Morvern died, the girls began to turn on each other, fighting in a way that they had never done before. And because Greer’s grandmother was considered unsuitable, the Gillieses suggested Greer live here. But Morvern’s death had changed Greer and although she hid it, I saw it in her eyes. When the sisters were there and turned their attention away, I could read Greer’s anger – and Greer had a lot of anger.