Alexander had explained to Rose that his friend’s estate was comprised largely of a very productive farm with many acres of arable land, but she saw immediately that it wasn’t on the scale of the Bembridge landholding. The house came into sight immediately and although it was impressive it looked to be a third of the size of Highfield Hall, with a long lawn and trees in front of it but none of the sculptured grounds of the Bembridge estate. According to Alexander the farm was situated in a valley to the north of the house and screened from view by woodland. Lawrence’s father was apparently a financier and the family home was in London, but a childless great-uncle had left Oakwood, as the little estate was called, to Lawrence in his will, which – in view of the accident – had given Lawrence an independence he might not otherwise have had. The farm was profitable and gave them an adequate income, but Alexander said they’d had to cut down on indoor staff in the house so he wasn’t sure if he was getting the full story from his friend.

The weather had worsened through the last part of the journey and it was now snowing quite thickly, big fat flakes falling from a low white sky. The carriage pulled up outside the house at the bottom of a set of half-circle stone steps which Rose would have considered grand if she hadn’t seen Highfield Hall, and it was a maid who answered the door to them, not a footman. They were ushered into a pleasant drawing room where Lawrence and Estelle were waiting for them and Rosaleen was sitting on a thick rug in front of a roaring fire playing with a number of dolls.

Rose liked Alexander’s friends immediately. Lawrence was a thin-faced man with a crop of black hair and deep-set brown eyes, but although Alexander had told her they were the same age Lawrence looked ten, twenty years older, probably – Rose thought – because of what he had gone through. His wife was a tiny, pretty woman who spoke with a slight French accent and was beautifully dressed, but there was a depth of sadness in her blue eyes that again revealed that the last years hadn’t been easy.

The introductions over, Rose found herself seated beside Estelle on a damask couch which had been pulled close to the fire, while the men sat back from the warmth a little, Lawrence in a wheelchair and Alexander in an armchair beside him. Betsy and Rosaleen had immediately started chattering as though they had seen each other the day before rather than two years ago and were soon engrossed in a game of their own making with Rosaleen’s numerous dolls.