The rain whispered down, soft as the touch of cobwebs, shrouding the green of the land in swathes of clinging grey. Maude had grown accustomed to the damp climate, to the clouds that constantly swept in, heavy and moist, off the Irish Sea. She had become used to hearing the soft, guttural tongue of the native Gaels in place of French and the stretched vowels of the English; to feeling as if she was living on the edge of the world, where the seasons moved, but time stood still. And always it rained.