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small sketchbook from his pocket. ‘I have become something of a recluse, I’m afraid. The only people I see these days are my servants and my old friend Father Martin.’ His face lit up. ‘I have my darling daughter, of course, my Jayne. She’s become the centre of my universe.’
    ‘I can understand that,’ Joe crouched down beside Eynon, watching his slim fingers capture the curve of the hill and somehow, even in pencil, the sparkle of the sea. Eynon was a talented man.
    ‘I’m sorry about the baby.’ Eynon stared outwards, seeing the vista before him in a way that another man might never see it. Perhaps the reason they got on so well was that Eynon saw the land as Joe did, as the property of no man.
    ‘We are coming to terms with the loss of our daughter,’ Joe said. ‘As for Lloyd, I think my son is sometimes lonely for the company of children his own age. Tutors are all well and good but being with adults doesn’t teach a lad how to grow in the world of a child.’
    ‘Perhaps I should bring Jayne over some time,’ Eynon said. ‘I suppose she should mix more with other children, too.’ He glanced up at Joe. ‘It’s just that I’m afraid of losing her.’ He chewed the end of his pencil. ‘I suppose there’s also the guilt about her mother, who died giving me my child.’ Eynon sighed. ‘I wish I could have loved her, just a little. Annabel was a good woman.’
    He smiled suddenly. ‘Of course it’s all the fault of that wife of yours. I’ve loved Llinos since the moment I first set eyes on her.’
    ‘I know,’ Joe said. ‘And she loves you too in her way.’ He watched the picture grow under Eynon’s skilled hands; it showed the sea, the sky, the hills and the outline of a sailing ship on the horizon.
    ‘That’s very good. It’s so full of life.’
    Eynon shrugged. ‘It’s all right, I suppose, but I’ll never make a real artist; my father wouldn’t allow me to have the training.’
    ‘I think natural talent outweighs any training,’ Joe said quietly. ‘In any case, why not hire an art tutor for your daughter and take lessons yourself?’ He smiled. ‘I expect you would find you knew more than the person supposed to be teaching you.’
    ‘It’s an idea,’ Eynon said. ‘Anyway, what are you doing up here on the hillside alone? Working something out in your head, if I know you.’
    ‘There, you have answered your own question.’ Joe smiled.
    ‘Well, only half of it. Do you feel like telling me more?’ Eynon closed his sketchbook and gave Joe his full attention. ‘Is anything wrong?’
    ‘Possibly,’ Joe said. ‘My mother is an elder now, I should go to America and see her.’
    Eynon’s fair hair covered his eyes for a moment but not before Joe saw the glint in them. ‘That’s not quite the whole truth, is it?’
    ‘It’s all I’m going to tell you.’
    Eynon got to his feet. ‘That’s all right, old chap,’ he said. ‘But if you go, remember that I specialize in taking care of ladies deserted by their husbands.’
    ‘So I’ve heard,’ Joe said dryly. He could hardly fail to hear the gossip about Eynon and the wife of the new bank manager. ‘Mrs Sparks is an attractive lady and her husband is not even absent I understand?’
    ‘Not in body, perhaps,’ Eynon said. ‘But he is a dry stick for all that he’s a young man and pompous to boot. I think his lady wife is glad of an escort to the balls at the assembly rooms.’
    Joe had heard tales of Mr Sparks’s pomposity from Llinos. When he had gone home last night she had been bursting with indignation. Mr Sparks thought he could dictate business terms to Llinos. He had actually advised her to sell the pottery. He was chancing his luck taking on a woman like Llinos.
    Joe had been glad of the distraction. How could he have explained his absence for the night to his wife? He could hardly explain his reluctance to resume intimacy with Llinos to himself. Was it the loss of the child? Or perhaps it was the