The press had been quick to pick up the family connection and that was not the kind of publicity her niece craved. Eleanor’s sister and brother-in-law, who was the governor’s right-hand man, had been more restrained, respecting her grief, or rather observing the decencies. They hadn’t said a word about Griff – but Eleanor was sure they shared their daughter’s views on the subject.

Eleanor felt a sudden urge to rise to her feet and speak out – recite aloud – make the dining car ring with the sound of her voice – command everybody’s attention with her tragic tale. She fought the urge down. Her tale would be quite wasted. The common herd would think her unbalanced. Pity, really, because she had such a good voice. It was of the ‘cultured’ American variety – without a trace of a nasal twang. She sounded like the late British actress Margaret Leighton, she always imagined. In Paris, on several occasions, she had been taken for an Englishwoman of irreproachable birth and breeding. Well, she cut a most elegant and unusual figure. She had been aware of people actually staring at her, simple souls – in admiration, awe and wonder, she had no doubt – and she had brought joy into their drab lives by giving them the little see-saw of a royal wave. (The hand going up and down, up and down, the wrist held rigid.)

‘All my relatives disapproved of Griff and his lifestyle,’ Eleanor said with a sigh. Fury came over her in waves as she thought of her relatives’ low, narrow, bestial minds. ‘They wouldn’t have condemned him if they’d had the slightest understanding of the world and its tricks.’