We walked through the long, low living room. Two smaller rooms had been knocked together to make a sitting area at one end and a kitchen at the other with French doors to the garden, which were extravagantly swagged and draped.

"Look at those," Babs waved her hand at them. "Wouldn't look out of place in Blenheim Palace, and that sofa." A very formal, high-backed pink damask affair with gold fringing stood in front of the wood-burning stove. "And a fire in a box." She sniffed. "Is there anything uglier?"

“They throw out a lot of heat and they're frightfully economical," I said in some display of loyalty.

“That's what they say about sensible shoes, they're frightfully comfortable and go on forever, but nothing beats a blazing log fire. Oh well, you'll muddle through, I suppose."

"I think it's amazing," Celia enthused, eyes shining. She went off to poke around in the little wooden kitchen at the end. "And the floor's gorgeous," she said, gazing down at the traditional dark Cornish slate.

"Yes, well, you can't ruin that. And upstairs is better. She kept it simple, thank goodness.”

We went up the stairs that led directly from the sitting room to where a bathroom and two double bedrooms, each decorated with plain white bedspreads, wooden chests of drawers, mirrors, and blue cotton rugs on the floor, were indeed simple. Celia went straight to the window, flung it open to the beach below, and leaned out. The sand was pale gold and seemed to stretch for miles beyond the dunes until it reached the sea. The blue-green water was calm and limpid as it lapped the shore. A few children paddled and a man walked his dog.

"Look at that." She breathed in deeply, shutting her eyes.

Babs smiled and came to suck her ciggie beside her. "Heaven, isn't it? You can never tire of that. But if you're thinking of painting on the beach down there, it gets a bit windy, and obviously it's quite accessible since it's only a hop and a skip over the dunes, so you might get a degree of interest. You'd be better off going down the coast path a bit to the one around the corner, down the cliff. It's more sheltered and private. Anyway, you'll work it out." She turned and headed back towards the stairs. “Drink? I took the precaution of bringing a bottle. I bet it flowed like glue at lunch."

"Actually, it was OK," Celia told her, following her down. "Although I could have done with a top-up. Flora was better placed, next to Roger, but Belinda seemed to be on water so I didn't want to lunge across her for the bottle and look like a dipso."