‘I am nice. I’m perfectly nice.’

Belle gave a little sigh of exasperation. ‘Darling, you know what I mean. At Norland, you were both—’

‘Norland was different,’ Elinor said. ‘We were different.’

‘But I thought you loved him?’

‘Ma,’ Elinor said, glaring, ‘I am not chasing after anyone. Right? And I am not discussing my most private feelings, or speculating about Edward’s, with anyone. Ever. OK?’

Belle had blinked. In her head she could hear Henry saying, in the conciliating tone peculiar to him, ‘Don’t upset yourself, my darling. Don’t be upset.’ She swallowed.

‘Very well, Ellie.’

Elinor had relaxed a little. ‘Thank you.’

‘I – just don’t want you to be unhappy, too.’

Elinor had given her a quick kiss. ‘I’m not.’

Well, she wasn’t, not actively and visibly, like Marianne so much of the time. But there was something there, a shadow, a reticence, a holding in, that made Belle’s heart ache for her oldest daughter, and drove her to search Elinor’s bedroom for something, anything, that would prove that Edward Ferrars – were he free of that monster of a mother – was true of heart. It was too bad, really it was, to have two out of three daughters involved with men who seemed addicted to muddle and mystery.

Elinor’s drawers were so unlike Marianne’s or Margaret’s. Both of them lived in persistent chaos: Marianne’s a charming, bohemian clutter of colour and texture; Margaret’s merely chaos. But Elinor’s possessions had a system to them, and an order. She would know where to find a navy sweater, or something to write with, or her driving licence. There were even box files, Belle was chagrined to see, labelled ‘Barton Cottage – Utilities’, and ‘Important Documents’ as well as a small pile of invoices, weighted with a big smooth pebble, with ‘Paid’ written across them in red pen. On the chest of drawers were photographs of – gulp – Henry, and little Harry, and the three Dashwood girls dressed for Christmas in tinsel wreaths, and one of her, Belle, standing in the herbaceous border at Norland in a huge straw hat, her arms full of delphiniums. And in front of the photographs was a series of Indian lacquered bowls of various sizes, holding Elinor’s necklaces and bracelets, jumbled up together and slightly dusty. Belle poked a finger into the smallest bowl, which held paper clips and a key or two and some rings, which she took out and laid on the chest of drawers. There was a ring made of turquoise Perspex and a brass ring – Indian? – inlaid with a domed reddish stone, veined like marble, and a plain, flat silver band. Belle picked it up and turned it round. It had a small blue stone set into one side. It was immediately familiar. It was exactly the same as the ring Margaret had noticed Edward wearing at supper, the first evening, which he’d been so embarrassed about, only smaller. Elinor and Edward had the same rings.

Carefully, Belle scooped up all three rings and stirred them back among the paper clips. They had the same rings, but they weren’t wearing them. And, plainly, they didn’t want to talk about why they possessed them and why they weren’t wearing them. They couldn’t have quarrelled, or Edward wouldn’t have come in the first place, or stayed for a whole week in the second. And, as Elinor, said, she’d been perfectly nice to him. Perhaps they were waiting for something to happen. Perhaps it was something to do with Edward’s mother, perhaps … There were feet on the gravel, just audible from Elinor’s bedroom at the side of the house. Belle walked quickly out on to the landing and opened the cupboard where Elinor had put the linen when they had first arrived at Barton Cottage. Maybe she was, as Elinor had suggested, silly to worry. Elinor didn’t look unhappy, and Edward was no unhappier than usual. The front door opened.

‘Ma?’ Marianne called out.

‘Up here!’ Belle cried. ‘Just sorting the towels!’

Tony Musgrove, for whom Elinor worked, had found her a car. It belonged to his stepson, who was working in Bolivia for three years, and who had said it was fine for someone else to use it, in fact he’d rather have it used than have it sitting on blocks in Tony Musgrove’s driveway. Tony said that the company would insure and tax it, if Elinor could pay for the petrol.

Elinor had hesitated. Tony, a blunt man in his forties, had stared at her. ‘Don’t you want it? Most people in your situation would jump at a chance like this.’

‘Oh, I do.’

‘Well, then.’

‘It’s just’, Elinor said, ‘that it’s so kind. And you mightn’t keep me on after three months. And then—’

‘We will,’ Tony Musgrove said. ‘You’re bloody good.’ He held out the car keys. ‘And bloody cheap. Now clear off.’

The car, Elinor thought, gingerly pushing the gears about before she started the engine, was hardly going to impress Margaret. It was, if anything, more dilapidated than Ed’s – best, really, not to think about Ed – and had been sprayed a colour which was very nearly orange. It made her visible in a way that was anathema to her, but it was a car. It would get her from Barton to work and Margaret from Barton to school. It would mean that they weren’t eternally dependent upon, and thus obliged to, Sir John. And it was truly kind of Tony Musgrove’s stepson and truly kind of the company. She was very lucky and she would take as much care to be very grateful as she could to demonstrate to everyone, but especially to her family, that nothing had changed between her and Edward because there wasn’t enough there, in the first place, to change, and also because nobody could do anything until he managed to break free of his mother.

Which, Elinor said to herself, carefully turning the car out of the car park and into the street, I am not going to have anything to do with. His mother is his problem, and not mine. And even if I wish that he would stand up to her, I know from personal experience how incredibly hard it is to stand up to a member of your own family who can make life unbelievably unpleasant for ages for everyone, if crossed. He is stuck. I am also, in consequence, stuck. But he was, for some reason that I was not prepared to ask him, wearing a ring identical to the one he gave me which he said he bought in a craft shop in Plymouth because the girl who made it was local and called Eleanor. So I take heart from that. I do. I will. It is very annoying to find that I haven’t got over him, at all – in fact, rather the reverse – but I am pretty sure he hasn’t got over me, either, so I won’t keep asking myself if I’m OK, like prodding at a sore tooth, because if I do, I will drive myself quite mad.

She pulled the car to an uneven halt outside Margaret’s school. Margaret had been persuaded to join the school’s homework club – ‘It is so unfair, why do I have to, why, Thomas’d always come and get me, he said he would, you are so, so mean’ – so that Elinor could collect her after work and they could come home together. Margaret was standing on the pavement, her skirt hitched unevenly high above her knees, scowling at her phone. She goggled at the car. ‘You’re not telling me that this is it?’

Elinor patted the passenger seat. ‘Hop in.’

‘It’s a joke. It’s completely dire. What if anyone sees me in it?’

‘They’ll think you’re very lucky not to have to use public transport. Good day?’

Margaret sighed and began to scrabble for her seat belt. ‘Don’t be ridic.’

‘What?’

‘You heard.’

‘What’, Elinor said patiently, ‘is ridic?’

Margaret turned to face her sister and mouthed the word elaborately. ‘Ridiculous.’

‘Ah.’

Margaret held her phone out. ‘Now look at this.’

‘I can’t, Mags. I’m driving.’

‘We can’t go straight home. We’ve got to go to the Park.’

‘What?’

‘Ma says. She texted. It’s Jonno and Mrs J. and everyone. We’ve got to meet Mrs J.’s other daughter or something.’

Elinor gave a little groan. ‘Why tonight?’

‘Search me. It’s bad enough Ed going, without this.’ She sighed again. ‘Nobody at school has a life like mine.’

Elinor patted her knee. ‘Poor old you.’

‘It’s all very well for you,’ Margaret said crossly. ‘You don’t mind.’

‘What don’t I mind?’

‘Well,’ Margaret said, ‘it’s all the same to you, isn’t it? You’re just fine, always.’ She glanced sideways at Elinor’s profile. ‘Aren’t you?’

‘Awful wet day,’ Sir John said exuberantly, kissing them all as they filed past him into the hall at Barton Park. ‘Pissing down.’ He gripped Marianne’s arm. ‘Far too wet for your usual walk to Allenham, eh?’

Marianne looked very grave and said nothing.

‘But I’ve got a party here!’ Sir John said. ‘I’ve got people! I’ve got food and drink and a fire and people! Too bad poor old Bill’s still stuck in London.’

There was a flurry in the doorway to the library and Mrs Jennings surged through, towing a very small, very pretty, very pregnant girl in her wake. ‘My dears. Dashwoods all. This is – Charlotte.’

Sir John put an arm round his sister-in-law. ‘She’s a peach, what?’

Belle, seeing what was expected of her, stepped forward and kissed Charlotte’s cheek. ‘She is indeed.’

Charlotte looked delighted. ‘Honestly. A peach! Look at the size of me, will you? I’m not due till after Christmas and I’m huge. Beached whales aren’t in it.’ She gave a peal of laughter. ‘Except that’s pretty insulting to whales, don’t you think?’

Elinor smiled at her. She was so pretty and so merry. And so unlike her taller, thinner and equally pretty sister. Then Elinor glanced at Marianne. She was looking away from them all at a painting of a boy in blue silk breeches, his hand on the head of an elegant dog, and her expression was not helpful. Elinor said quietly, ‘M?’