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“You can’t blame yourself,” said Sylvia.

“What would you know about it?” Izzie snapped. “You haven’t seen Mum in years.”

Sylvia pursed her lips tightly, fighting the instinct to hurl back a barb. Her sister didn’t need that right now, and heaven knew it wouldn’t help matters.

“Why did you write to me rather than telephone?” she asked. “I would have come straightaway.”

“I thought it was best,” said Izzie. “Besides, I wasn’t certain of your exchange.”

“It’s the same as it has been since Hugo and I were married,” she said.

“I’d forgotten.” A lie, she was certain of it, but now was not the time to press her sister.

“Well, I telephoned you because I would like the details of the funeral arrangements,” she said, taking up the silver pencil that lay next to the book she used for messages.

“Why?” Izzie asked.

“Because, Isabelle”—her voice hardened—“although you might find it hard to believe, I would like to attend my mother’s funeral.”

There was a long pause on the line before finally Izzie said, “You made your choice, Sylvia. You aren’t regretting it now, are you?”

She closed her eyes. No, she didn’t regret her choice. It was just that… if she didn’t attend her mother’s funeral, she was certain she would one day come to hate herself for it.

“The details, please,” she said.

She could hear the reluctance in Izzie’s voice as she related the funeral arrangements. There would be a service at St. Anne’s, their old parish church, on Friday morning. The burial would take place just across Salisbury Road in the Paddington Old Cemetery.

“Thank you,” she said when her sister finished.

“You don’t have to do this, you know,” said Izzie.

“What do you mean?”

“You hadn’t even seen her in—what has it been?—three years?”

It was more likely four. In a moment of guilt, Sylvia had decided her annual Christmas card was not enough. Knowing that, in a rare turn of events, she and Hugo would not be spending the Christmas season in Tunbridge Wells at his parents’ home, she’d taken it upon herself to suggest her mother and Izzie come for Boxing Day lunch. She’d written the invitation and posted it before she could second-guess her actions, risking Hugo’s annoyance when she told him that, much to her surprise, her mother had accepted, making it clear her mother would be coming alone.

The day had been a disaster from the start. Her mother had sat on the very edge of the drawing room sofa, handbag held on her lap like a shield. Sylvia’s hopes for a pleasant afternoon dipped ever further as she watched her mother peer about at the flat with a mixture of judgment and resentment. At the lunch she’d taken pains to cook herself, no one spoke. When at last Sylvia had risen to clear the dishes of the final course away, Hugo had retreated to his study, leaving her mother alone. It had fallen to Sylvia to see her mother into a cab, and she’d breathed a sigh of relief as it drove away. That day, she’d resolved never to expose either of them to the discomfort of another holiday spent together again.

Now she stared at the details of the funeral arrangements, wondering what wretched daughter would ever think that about her own mother.

“I will be at the service and the burial,” she said, drawing back her shoulders.

“Not Hugo?” asked her sister, the sarcasm coming clearly across the crackling line.

“He’s a surgeon lieutenant-commander in the Royal Navy Medical Service,” she said shortly. “He has been serving on ships since leaving basic training, Izzie, so he is indisposed.”

Her sister sniffed, but apparently even Izzie couldn’t find fault with Hugo’s service. “Fine.”

The line went dead, Izzie’s unvarnished disapproval reverberating through Sylvia’s chest.

Chapter Four

On Friday morning, Izzie clutched at the lapels of her coat as she walked into St. Anne’s with Miss Reid by her side. She would never admit it to anyone, but she’d been terrified waking up and knowing that in a few short hours she would need to put on a black dress, coat, gloves, and hat and say goodbye to Mum.

She’d dressed deliberately, making sure every seam was straight and every hair in place. However, she’d been unable to force herself to put on her hat, the last thing she needed to do before leaving, until the flat’s doorbell rang. She’d hurried down the narrow stairs that led to the street and found Miss Reid standing on the front step, sheltering under an umbrella against the swiftly falling rain.

“Put your hat on, Miss Shelton. We’ll walk over together,” the seamstress had said shortly, and Izzie had done as she was told.