Everyone immediately sobered, for the amount of damage an outraged boar could do was considerable, and the pig’s owner would be responsible.

Tess, seeing the farmer’s speed begin to slacken, thought Crippen had beaten them. ‘Only I reckon he’ll be too tired to wreak havoc as he would have done had he been fresh,’ Tess panted, as she and Jonty entered the village. ‘Besides, I dare say everyone will be out checking on the damage the hailstones have done and no doubt they’ll give a hand to get Crippen back where he belongs.’

This was true, and in fact the only person injured by Crippen’s escapade was Tess herself. Unwisely, once he was back in his own pen, she felt quite sorry for him and leaned into the sty to give him the last of the mangels. Far from showing appreciation of her kind act, however, Crippen grabbed it so quickly and wrenched it from her fingers so rudely that within five minutes her wrist was swollen to twice its normal size and was plum-coloured as well. Tess wailed and turned to Jonty for sympathy, but got none. ‘I told you not to go near him, because he’s that ratty he’d bite his best friend if he had one,’ Jonty said. ‘Oh, Tess, I planned to do all sorts over the next couple of days, because you’ve worked so hard . . . It hasn’t put you off us, has it? You’ll still come back next year, won’t you?’

This conversation took place after Tess had visited the doctor in the village and been told to wear a sling and to put cold water compresses on her wrist two or three times a day. ‘You’ll be fine, but don’t let Mrs Bell tease you into using that arm,’ the doctor had said, clearly well aware of Mrs Bell’s propensity to see that everyone around her was doing their bit.

So now Tess pulled a face at her old friend. ‘Of course it won’t put me off coming again, if I’m invited,’ she said. ‘But you’re to write me long interesting letters, Jonty, and I’ll write to you, and we’ll telephone each other every two or three months; we’ll arrange when by letter.’

Later that day Mrs Bell approached Tess and suggested that she might like to stay on, since they were sadly in need of extra help to undo the damage caused by the hailstorm. ‘That’s been a terrible summer, first the awful heat and the drought, then the gale, and lastly that there hailstorm,’ she said. ‘If you’d care to stay on for the last two or three weeks of the school holidays, me and Mr Bell – and Jonty too – would be rare grateful.’

For the first time, Tess thanked providence for her injured wrist. ‘It’s awfully kind of you, Mrs Bell,’ she said meekly. ‘But the doctor told me not to use my arm for at least three weeks, maybe longer. So I wouldn’t be very much use, even if my grandmother would allow me to extend my – my, er, holiday.’