Sometime overnight, the position of my shoes had been altered. I distinctly remembered having left them by the fire, sole to the floor. Now they were leaning against the wall – toes to the ground and heels to the wallpaper. Had Greer done this when she came in early to leave water? I imagined her, in my room, moving them for some purpose known only to herself. There was nobody else I could think of who would undertake such a thing. If it were Greer, had she paused and watched me sleeping? The idea of her louring presence looking down on me in silence, left me faintly sick. I finished dressing and went to raise Mary from her bed.

She was deeply asleep. There was a faint darkening of the skin beneath her eyes, a shadow that spoke of restless nights, and I frowned, recalling Miss Gillies’ tone of the night before. A doctor. I did not like the direction my thoughts took at such a consultation. I remembered the doctor in Edinburgh’s grave voice outside my door and knew what it was he suggested to the MacAllisters. Knew the place he recommended I should be sent if I did not improve. Could the same fate be in Miss Gillies’ mind?

That morning, I spent longer on Mary’s appearance, curling her hair and setting it with ribbons and clips and cleaning her face and nails until they shone.

Downstairs, the house vibrated with a new energy. Greer was waxing the floor and Magda polishing the fireplace.

‘Good morning,’ I said. I opened my mouth to mention the shoes but almost as quickly changed my mind. If she sought to frighten me then I would only give her satisfaction by letting her know that her actions had been noted.

Magda looked up, brushing the back of her hand across her brow. The smell of beeswax and lemon oil hung in the corridor and a warm scent of baking drifted from the kitchen. Miss Gillies was in the dining room, her hair neatly made into a knot at the back of her head and held with a diamond clip.

Mary seemed anxious about the forthcoming visit and I was keen to fill her morning with something distracting. The rain had been replaced with a watery sun and we left the house, taking a kite with us. At Gulls Cry I glanced up at the streaked windows but Mary kept her head down, unwinding the string on the bobbin with fixed concentration.

‘Come on, Mary,’ I said. ‘Let’s make it fly.’

The string was unspooled but the kite bounced to the sand and she gave me a nervous look.