The kitchen was vast, with marbled sinks, a huge range, pots and pans hanging from racks and in the centre a table, scarred many times with the scores of careless knives. Salted fish and dried herbs hung from hooks on the ceiling.

The teapot gave off a faint wisp of steam as she poured and pushed a bowl of stew and a plate of cold fare in my direction. I ate gratefully, listening with only half an ear to her conversation.

‘It’s good to have you. Mary’s in proper need of a nanny.’

‘How long since the last one left?’

‘Hettie?’ Her lips tightened a fraction. ‘A few months now, but it’s not always easy to find a replacement. There’s not many would want to leave the bustle of an Edinburgh life for the likes of here.’ Her eyes raked me curiously.

‘Hettie chose a bad time to leave,’ I said. ‘Mary must still have been grieving for her mother.’

‘She was. They both were.’

‘I was very sorry to hear that William had died. How long since they lost him?’

‘Barely weeks after Hettie had gone.’

‘Miss Gillies did not say in her correspondence how he died.’

Mrs Lenister pulled a chopping board towards her and began peeling apples. There was an awkwardness to her manner. ‘Did she not? Well, it was an accident, but the mistress prefers we don’t discuss William, I’m afraid.’

I wondered at that. After Papa had passed, Clara and I remembered him often in our conversations; it brought pain but there had always been comfort too. Perhaps here, the subject of William’s death caused too much distress.

‘You look concerned, Miss Swansome,’ she said. ‘Your post here should be an easy one. Mary is an obedient child.’

I decided I had questioned Mrs Lenister enough. My eyes took in some of the details of the kitchen – the windows and walls running with condensation and a dark patch on the ceiling which grew green spores at its edges.

While I drank my tea, we talked of my journey and a little of where I had lived in Edinburgh. When I had finished, she suggested she show me the way to my bedroom.

Walking a little in front, she guided me through the house and up a staircase to where a mullioned window captured prisms of the autumnal rays. As we went, Mrs Lenister enlightened me as to the geography of the house. The walls were panelled and the carpeting so thin as to show through in places. I had imagined more: a residence with plusher furnishings, brightly lit and welcoming.