Chloe jumped up and ran into her arms. ‘Oh Gran! I’m so sorry.’

The two stood hugging one another for a long time.

‘I’m sorry too, Mrs Simmonds.’ Neil crept forward. ‘My dad is going to kill me,’ he said in a low voice. ‘We sunk his boat.’

Theresa put out her other arm and wrapped it around Neil, at the same time hoping Roger was all right.

Sally backed slowly away. But not before overhearing the strangest snippet of conversation: ‘The chocolate brownies which you took from my kitchen?’

‘We didn’t have time to save them. They went down with the ship before we even tasted them.’

‘Thank God for that!’

Mystified, Sally moved over to the nearby seat where Eggy sprawled, exhausted, but at least displaying some colour back in his cheeks. He sat up and shot her an embarrassed smile. ‘I’m so sorry, darling.’ He stood and spoke to the paramedic who had been helping him. ‘May I?’

The paramedic indicated that it was fine for him to go.

‘I have to say, Salz, that that was one of the worst days of my whole life.’ Tottering slightly, he limped along at Sally’s side. ‘But in the end it was worth it. Because I witnessed you being so brave and so calm. Thank you.’

‘I’ve got to go to Wardrobe and get out of this dress.’ Sally pushed her damp hair out of her face. ‘And while we walk, you can tell me now why you were late on set today.’

‘Oh dear,’ Eggy grunted. ‘You may recall I told you I had a hot lunch date.’

Sally lowered her voice to say: ‘Don’t tell me it was with Theresa?’

‘Theresa? No! Whatever gave you that idea? It was a woman I had met on the seafront in Bellevue-sur-Mer. I invited her to lunch. I thought we would have some fun.’

‘By the sound of it much too much fun.’

‘She told me she had a hotel room waiting, and . . . well, I’m just a man, Sally . . .’

Sally sighed. The same old story.

‘But it seems that the woman had some axe to grind with me. She’s the one who came up to rescue us from that village. Actually I don’t remember a thing about it.’

‘Carol?’

‘Yes. Carol. She had got it into her head that I was casting my favours around a little too liberally and decided to teach me a lesson by tempting me to a hotel room, where she told me she’d give me a massage . . .’

‘Oh Eggy!’ Sally didn’t know which of them she was most cross with . . . or disappointed by.

The two actors climbed the steps of the wardrobe van.