There was movement in the undergrowth and she shot onto the pavement and stumbled away in the drizzle. Her legs took her south to Waverley and then up the hill to the towering claustrophobia of the Old Town. She was numbed with cold and her body was close to shutting down. Before she even realised, she found herself heading to the Market Street Gate.

As the first light of a new day blossomed across the Forth, the Gate Keepers let her in. They helped her along East Tunnel, but didn’t ask why she came at this hour, sodden, frozen and wordless.