“Very pale blush pink, quite short, with the family tiara at a jaunty angle. There's a photo of her coming out of the family chapel in Venice with Filippo, both roaring with laughter."

Celia gazed at me, rapt. "I've got the most terrific crush."

I smiled. "I know."

I turned to wash the glasses at the sink. I knew, too, that Babs sort of vindicated Celia's rather rootless, nomadic existence: her refusal to find Mr Right. Her attraction to Mr Wrong, to married men, actually, or to introspective loners like the current one, Edward. But I also knew that pitching it low as Celia did, never pitching it too high, stemmed more from a fear of being hurt. And Babs wasn't like that. She wasn't afraid of anyone.

"Come on, let's get the stuff in from the car, then we can go for a swim."

Celia watched as I went outside, still deep in some romantic reverie of a few decades ago. I went back and forth to the car, but when I was halfway up the stairs, she was behind me suddenly and helped me with a heavy case to the landing.

"But do you not look at her sometimes, Flora, and think, for heaven's sake?"

I knew where she was going with this. I turned.

"You mean, for heaven's sake, why am I still metaphorically walking across a desert with a burning cross in my hands? When there are other ways of being, of living, which don't involve a husband and children and all that I envy, aspire to, and once had?"

"Well, I wasn't going to be quite so—"

"Brutal. Yes, I get all that, Celia. And funnily enough, although we're very different people, Babs is an inspiration to me. She's strong, she's brave and I have to force myself to be those things." I paused. Narrowed my eyes contemplatively beyond her. "But she's also a minx. And I have a nasty feeling I've been set up here."

"What d’you mean?"

"I don't know yet. But trust me, I can smell that particular Scarlet Virgin –" I sniffed the air theatrically – "a mile off."

I smiled and sailed back downstairs, past her, through the sitting room and out to the car, for more luggage.

Chapter 4