‘What do you mean “you think”? Either he is or he isn’t, what’s he done?’ And Grace told him about what happened at the airport and on the train and then tonight, how attentive he was, the compliments and then the arm looping thing and touching her hair. Silence followed. Then, ‘He fancies the pants off you! A man doesn’t say or do stuff like that unless he wants you. And that’s the top and bottom of it!’ Jamie declared.

‘Must you be so dramatic?’ she whispered. ‘What if I’m just being desperate?’

‘What do you mean, desperate?’ he puffed, as if the very notion was preposterous.

‘You know, imagining it all. It’s been a while. Maybe I’m out of touch and he’s just being friendly, a shoulder to cry on as it were …’

‘Oh, Grace, please tell me you didn’t cry on him? I want you to be having the time of your life, not feeling sad.’

‘No, not literally crying, as in crying actual tears. I just talked about Cora, what it’s really like looking after her. You know, how cruel she can be. And how indifferent the others are about it all.’

‘Ah, well that’s OK. Not that it’s OK what Cora says, and I will have a word with her before you get back. But it’s OK that you feel relaxed enough with Ellis to talk to him. I’m liking the sound of him already.’

‘But what if I’m letting my neediness and loneliness or whatever you want to call it get in the way of proper, rational thought. It could just be wishful thinking, that someone like Ellis would fancy me. It’s not like real life here. It’s a bit like being in a dream, in fact …’

‘OK, Grace, listen to me. Firstly you are not desperate. You are bloody gorgeous. You are bright, caring and kind,’ he said, echoing Ellis’s words from earlier in the restaurant. ‘Plus, you can knit the longest scarves in the entire universe.’

‘Oi, I thought you liked my scarves,’ she laughed.

‘I do, but they are a bit long, to be fair.’

‘OK. Maybe I do get carried away, but there isn’t much else to do when you’re sitting up all night on watch duty with a bedbound mother.’

‘Well, you’ll be able to knock that on the head when you get home and get a proper night’s sleep, as madam does not need her lamp turning on every five minutes! Anyway, getting back to the flirtation theory: he looped your arm through his, remember, you didn’t run after him all whiny-like and pleading, “Please Ellis, please, please, please flirt with me because I’m just sooo needy” …’

‘Ha-ha, you know what I mean, Jamie.’

‘No, I don’t. Tell me,’ he said, annoyingly.