After a brief demo with Mervin, Theresa stowed her phone away, kissed her daughter goodbye, left the school and headed for the Tube. While the trains were still running in the open and she still had a decent signal, she bought her ticket to Nice airport. She was booked on a flight at half past eight. She’d touch down just before midnight.

After Sally had given the first table their menus, she went into the kitchen to check on Carol, who was packing up the thermal boxes with the first batch of the evening’s deliveries.

‘Frankly, Sally,’ Carol drawled, ‘once we relinquish this place we should set up a full-time home-delivery service. This restaurant may be on its last legs. But the delivery joint is jumping. We could easily do it from home.’

Over at the range, Benjamin threw some panisse into the fat fryer which emitted a loud hiss.

Carol zipped up the last bag, and strode out through the back door.

William and Benjamin turned to Sally and smiled beatifically.

She was starting to wonder if they weren’t both on drugs. She’d never seen them so merry, quiet and content. Normally, wherever they were, they could be heard squabbling and sniping at one another. Maybe it was the simple act of cooking which had calmed them. Kitchen life obviously had a tranquillising effect for some people.

Sally pushed back into the dining room to take first orders.

Another table had arrived and seated themselves.

Strange, she had not heard the bell. But maybe it had pinged when Carol was talking. Her voice was sometimes loud enough to drown out a thunderclap.

A woman was standing, glaring, near the desk. She spoke in French: ‘As no one was here to welcome us, I sat my guests at the corner table.’

Sally felt as though she had seen this woman before somewhere but couldn’t exactly place her. She was a typical Côte d’Azur beach-woman – flashily dressed, tanned, blonde, her stretched forehead shiny from Botox, her pale-pink glistening lips bursting with filler.

Sally moved to the desk to mark off the table on the plan.

‘Madame de la Warr?’ she asked.

‘Exacte!’ spat the woman. ‘Odile de la Warr.’

Again, the name sounded familiar to Sally.

Bearing three menus, she walked Madame de la Warr to her table, where, rather rudely in Sally’s opinion, the other two had already seated themselves.

As Sally pulled out a chair her eyes caught those of one of the diners at Madame de la Warr’s table.

‘Salzy, darling! Bet you didn’t think you’d see us again so soon, did you, poppet?’ It was Eggy Markham.

‘Erm no, I suppose I . . . What are you doing here?’

‘Well, what with one thing and another, we’ve decided to stay a little longer and we thought we’d surprise you!’