Jimmy laughed. ‘His tail says “come in”, and his mouth says “stay out”,’ he remarked. ‘Shall I knock on the back door, Auntie Glenys? I’m sure I just saw movement through that window.’ Without waiting for an answer, and ignoring the dog’s low growl, he stepped up to the door and beat a tattoo upon the blistered paintwork with his knuckles.

They barely had to wait thirty seconds before the door swung open to reveal a large black-bearded man with a scar etched across his forehead. He was grinning. Glenys’s heart jumped into her mouth. ‘Sorry, wrong house,’ she gabbled, and turned to run, but Mo was ahead of her, streaking across the cobbles. But Jimmy, to Glenys’s astonishment, gave a shriek and leapt forward.

‘Dad! Oh, Dad!’ he cried, clasping the man around the waist and burying his head in his broad chest. ‘Oh, Dad, where have you been?’ He twisted in the man’s grasp. ‘Mo, you little idiot, don’t you recognise your own father when you see him?’

The man let go of Jimmy and held out a hand. Mo had stopped and was staring back at the house, eyes round with fear. ‘That’s not our daddy,’ she said doubtfully. ‘Our daddy didn’t have a beard; nor he didn’t have a horrid cut on his forehead. Oh, Jimmy, it looks awful like Cyril Huxtable to me; and awful like the man who chased me at the puppy station.’

The man sat down on the step and smiled at Mo. ‘Don’t tell me my bright little button still doesn’t recognise me,’ he said. ‘It was understandable on the railway platform, but now that you’ve had a good look at me . . .’

Mo gave a strangled sob and threw herself into his arms, pushing Jimmy aside. ‘So you recognise me at last,’ her father exclaimed, in a voice somewhere between elation and tears. ‘I’m so sorry I frightened you at the station, but I’ve been hunting for you for what seems like weeks, and then, when I saw you at last, I wasn’t sure it really was you. You’ve grown, queen, and it’s over a year since I saw you last. Now we’d best go indoors, because explaining what’s been happening to us all is going to take some time. And I can introduce you to your grandparents.’

Glenys looked at them. Sam Trewin had risen to his feet with Mo still in his arms, and Jimmy was leaning against his shoulder. They looked so happy, such a complete family group, that envy flooded her, and she spoke more sharply than she intended. ‘How do you come to be here at all, Mr Trewin? For all your children knew you might have been dead.’

Sam Trewin looked her up and down, and it was not a friendly look. ‘Who are you?’ he asked. ‘When I first arrived home I learned that the children had disappeared. Are you a Huxtable? Because the neighbours told me the Huxtables must have had something to do with it.’ His gaze swept her again, his inspection insultingly thorough. ‘I suppose you posed as a friend when you took them away from Solomon Court.’