‘Absolutely, Mr Mayhood,’ Charlie said. ‘There’s plenty I could do with my room. Plenty.’ The boy was putting in the extra effort now: she really felt for him.

‘Shouldn’t be a problem for me either,’ Joyce said. And she dropped a hand upon her brother’s shoulder, peering down at him. ‘We’re both extremely grateful to you, Mr Mayhood, for this opportunity. We don’t intend to let you down. Do we, Charlie?’ They might not have been sentiments that she’d been coached to say, but they were delivered with the flatness and the fluency of wedding vows, rehearsed so many times inside her head that all the music had gone out of them.

‘No,’ said Charlie. ‘We’re extremely grateful.’

‘Thanks aren’t necessary,’ Arthur said. ‘Without you two, we’d only have an empty house and too much land to cope with. You’re the reason for this place, not the excuse.’ He waved them forward, into the spread of sunshine that the shutters couldn’t block: a white trapezium of daylight that burned in from the picture window every summer afternoon, vanishing the pattern on the rug, fading the lampshades and the spines of all their books. It was a blessing and a curse. ‘Let me show you to your places. Then you’ll really feel at home.’

They each had a draughting table of their own: Joyce’s faced the window at the north end of the room; Charlie’s faced the stone partition to the south. They took their seats with reverence, as though they’d found positions at the bridge of some great ocean-going vessel. At first, they didn’t seem prepared to touch a thing that lay before them. Then Arthur told them, ‘Please, it’s fine. You needn’t wait for my permission. We’ve given you the basics – have a look there, in the drawers. Some of it is second-hand equipment, but it’s all top quality. Florence has made sure of it.’

Months ago, she’d gone to Guildford to procure supplies: a few mahogany T-squares with ebony edges; celluloid set squares (45°, 60°, plus a couple of adjustables); some folding two-foot rules; two boxwood scales with divisions; pencils (regular, mechanical); pots of waterproof ink; India rubber and erasers; watercolours, sable brushes, draughting tape. And she’d gone slightly over budget for two cases of used instruments in pristine condition: bow compass sets with good sharp needles. Returning home that day, seeing the bench seat of the Austin stacked with what she’d bought, she’d glowed with a sensation other women must’ve felt when nesting for a newborn. Those women had their Moses baskets, woollen hats and booties, little muslin squares in pretty tissue parcels; and there she’d been with all her draughtman’s implements, wrapped in the supply store’s thick brown paper. That was just the way things had to be for now.

‘What’s this, Mr Mayhood?’ Joyce asked. She was skimming through the home-made pamphlet Arthur had prepared and planted in their drawers. Fifty-something pages, typed and carbon-copied from the published volume, held together with brass fasteners. The title, An Organic Architecture, was hand-lettered in red. He’d made these pamphlets a few nights ago, while she was stripping down the tractor motor in the garage.