‘All the same, I would not have disturbed you at this late hour if it were not absolutely necessary,’ Agnes Crowther said, thinking how Cook was not the only one to have ‘too many things on my mind’. Looking away from Cook, she raised the long, slender fingers of her left hand to her temple, gently massaging the area with a look of discomfort on her face. ‘I have the most dreadful headache.’

‘I’ll fetch you a powder at once, ma’am.’ Cook put her hand on the door knob. ‘Will there be anything else, ma’am?’ She suddenly thought of the letter. Her heart beat furiously at the idea of revealing it to the mistress. She wanted to, oh so much, but she was half-afraid of what Agnes Crowther’s reaction would be.

But then the anxious woman was afforded a golden opportunity when, in answer to her question, the lady of the house peered at her most intently, as though secretly debating some inner thought. Presently she said, ‘You have been with us a very long time… you must know us all so well.’ She smiled, but it was a sad, lonely smile. ‘Of course, you recall the day when my brother Thadius Grady came to live at Breckleton House.’ She appeared not to be directly talking to Cook now. Instead she seemed to be rambling, lost in thought. ‘My brother… so trusting… so desperate that his adored daughter should be well taken care of.’ Here she gave a small, cynical laugh. ‘Like Breckleton House itself, Thadius was in a state of decline when he came here to live. Yet, because of his kindness and generosity, the house was restored to its former glory. And how did we manage to repay him?’ Her head was lowered as though in shame as, with broken voice, she went on, ‘By denying him the comfort of Emma by his side when he needed her most… cried out for her! And after his death, by betraying his most heartfelt wish… that Emma should be well taken care of.’

There followed a long, painfully drawn-out silence during which Cook remained silent and motionless. She was deeply shocked at the manner in which Agnes Crowther had uttered such shameful and private thoughts in her presence. Such a thing had never occurred in this household all the years Cook had been retained there. Yet, in some strange, instinctive way, in that moment it seemed so very natural. With tingling astonishment, Cook suddenly realized that the mistress had been drinking. There, on the table beside her, was a half-empty sherry decanter and a partly filled glass. So that was it! They did say that the drink loosened a body’s tongue.

‘I was not altogether innocent in the proceedings regarding Emma. I am not proud of that fact… and I have since lived to regret it.’

‘I’ll go and fetch the powder, ma’am.’ Cook was suddenly afraid of hearing things she had no right to know – or perhaps of having the contents of that letter confirmed. She would have made a discreet exit there and then. But suddenly she was confronted by Agnes Crowther’s direct question and it frustrated her intention.