‘Yes: any luck on the house-hunting front?’ Gran asked. ‘Time is not on our side. Albert has actually offered to move into a hostel so that we can take over his flat if we find ourselves on the street. But I know you wouldn’t like that, and neither would I. So, any ideas?’

Tess sat back on the bench, shaking her head. ‘No, I’m afraid not. Did I tell you that the person who was going to take on the milliner’s shop and the flat has dropped out? The landlord, Mr Egbert, was quite nice about it really. He said he felt mean asking us to vacate the premises whilst you were still recovering in hospital. So now we’ve got a breathing space, because he’ll have to re-advertise and so on.’

‘What about Miss Foulks, though?’ Gran asked. ‘She was going to leave at the end of last week. She’d made all her arrangements to move in with her sister.’

‘Oh, she’s already gone. There was no point in her hanging on since she had virtually no stock left to sell anyway,’ Tess explained. ‘It’s rather annoying in a way because I told everyone that we’d let them know our change of address as soon as we know it ourselves, but in the meantime would they send all letters, invoices, bills et cetera to Mr Albert Payne, the tobacconist.’ She laughed. ‘Poor Albert, he’ll be getting a bumper post for a while, but he says he doesn’t mind. Oh, Gran, you’ve no idea how lonely it is in the flat without you! It wasn’t so bad when Jonty was staying at Albert’s because they either came round to our place or I went round to theirs in the evenings. But now when I’m not at work I’m on my own most of the time except when I’m here at the hospital.’

‘What about Snowy?’ Gran asked. She beamed. ‘I like Snowy. He brings me presents.’

Tess sniggered. ‘A bag of acid drops and you’re anyone’s,’ she declared. ‘But you’re right, I do see quite a bit of him. But of course that will all stop when he goes off to university in October.’

Gran raised her eyebrows. ‘Goes away? What’s wrong with Liverpool, may I ask? He has a cousin working on this ward, so he’s been able to get permission to pop in and see me in the afternoons, and he told me he’d almost decided to go to our very own place of learning, in other words Liverpool University. Hasn’t he told you that? I only wish you were heading in the same direction, and it’s all my fault that you’re not. Snowy will go on to greater things whilst you, my darling, will lose the chance I’ve always wanted for you: to go to university and get a degree.’

Tess shook her head. ‘I’m not clever enough really, Gran; the work was already beginning to get me down. And you know Snowy, or must do by this time. He waffles airily on about choosing between Oxford and Cambridge, but I believe most of their intake is from Eton and Harrow and places like that. And anyway, don’t they have their own entrance requirements? I think settling for red brick is probably a good idea, since it will mean he can live at home and save his money. I think he’s going to do a maths degree, or maybe physics and chemistry, but anyway something which would bore the rest of us rigid. Still, it’s nice of him to visit you, Gran.’