The young man who walked forwards had the kind of gait Marjorie associated with the teenage louts she glimpsed occasionally in Colsterworth. Priest, my arse, she thought.

Quinn was dressed in a flowing robe of some incredibly black material; it looked like the kind of habit a millionaire monk would wear. There was no crucifix in sight. The face which smiled out at her from the voluminous hood was coldly vulpine. She noticed how everyone in his entourage was very careful not to get too close to him.

“Intrigued, Father Dexter,” she said, letting her irony show.

He blinked, and nodded thoughtfully, as if in recognition that they weren’t fooling each other.

“Why are you here?” Louise asked breathlessly.

“Cricklade is going to be a refuge for Quinn’s sect,” Grant Kavanagh said. “There was a lot of damage in Boston. So I offered him full use of the estate.”

“What happened?” Marjorie asked. Years of discipline necessary to enforce her position allowed her to keep her voice level, but what she really wanted to do was grab hold of Grant’s jacket collar and scream in his face. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Genevieve scramble down off her horse and run over to greet her father, her delicate face suffused with simple happiness. Before Marjorie could say anything, Louise thrust out an arm and stopped her dead in her tracks. Thank God for that, Marjorie thought; there was no telling how these aloof strangers would react to excitable little girls.

Genevieve’s face instantly turned woeful, staring up at her untouchable father with widened, mutinous eyes. But Louise kept a firmly protective arm around her shoulder.

“The rebellion is over,” Grant said. He hadn’t even noticed Genevieve’s approach.

“You mean you rounded up the Union people?”

“The rebellion is over,” Grant repeated flatly.