“Who else? Cormac was the first one down here, he might have taken things he didn’t want us to find. Personal things. Something to do with his relationship to Olivia. But somehow I don’t picture him out on a hillside in the dark, with a fire blazing. The smart thing would have been to carry them back to London and burn them there, where no one would notice.”

“Why in the dark? Why do you think this was done at night?”

Rachel shrugged. “It has that kind of feeling. Clandestine?”

Next, he took her into the house and up to Olivia’s room. She entered it reluctantly, looking around her as if somehow she’d see the other woman standing silently in the shadows. He opened the closet and began to work. She watched, trusting him in spite of herself to explain when he was ready, but she started when one of the canes fell to the floor with a loud clatter, indicating that she was very tense. He continued to remove boxes from the back of the closet without a word, then pulled out the shelf, and carried it to the window.

Rachel followed him, and bent over him, curiosity aroused, their heads nearly touching as he worked, using his penknife carefully to draw out the strip of wood, then the cotton. Finally, on the windowsill as before lay the row of small gold objects, sparkling in the sun, telling a tale without words.

Rachel gasped, moving them about in turn with her fingertip.

“That’s Rosamund’s ring. Her father gave it to her when she was very young. And a silver box of wax, so that she could seal all her letters. She wore it on her little finger, sometimes, even when she’d outgrown it. And I remember Anne wearing that locket! She’d let me look at the pictures, if I was quiet in church. Were these Richard’s? The cuff buttons? Olivia used to put them in for him, to help Nanny—he couldn’t be still for an instant. And that fob’s Nicholas’, he was so proud of it. James gave him his first watch, and Rosamund gave him the fob. It was a beautiful watch. Stephen let me have it—when—when he was going through Nicholas’ room. The fob had been in the family for ages. I thought perhaps he’d taken that. And that pipe cleaner is James’, he carried it everywhere he went. I always thought it was much too handsome to use in a pipe, and he laughed when I told him so. I don’t know about the crucifix. Was that the one Susannah mentioned? Brian’s? I never saw Cormac wearing one.”

‘‘Yes, it has Brian’s initials on the back. See?”

He turned it over, and she peered at it for a moment. “They all have initials on them,” he told her. “The mark of the owner.”