‘It is. I can’t tell you how life-enhancing it is to hear birds instead of nothing but traffic, as I did for so many years in Hong Kong and Singapore. Not that I didn’t enjoy them greatly in other ways,’ she added.

‘It must be a very different life.’

‘Yes. But then, you chose a very different life too.’

Philippe acknowledged this with another shrug. ‘So how are things going up at the château?’

‘Exciting. Scary. Good, I think. We are still in the middle of a lot of renovations.’

‘And you have new neighbours, I hear.’

‘Yes.’ Meredith took a deep breath. ‘The less said about that the better, I think.’

‘Don’t worry. Margot will have her hands full with her husband. He’s really quite ill, I think.’

‘I’m sure you’re right,’ lied Meredith. Margot, she suspected, would be out of the sickroom at the first sign of serious illness. As long as she wasn’t back up at the château continually asking for a cup of caviar.

Behind them, Jean-Christophe was still staring intently into the water, with Nelly devotedly at his feet, looking up at him as though she’d just met the two-legged hero she’d been waiting for all her life.

‘If it isn’t too terrible a pun,’ Philippe pointed out to his son, ‘I think you’re finally hooked on fishing!’

‘Dad, look!’ Behind them in the water there was a sudden flurry of movement and a definite tug on the line. ‘It’s him! I know it’s him!’ breathed Jean-Christophe.

Meredith was about to dive on Nelly and pick her up bodily, but with her new hero next to her she sat quiet as a lapdog in a handbag, giving every impression of a bored girlfriend at a cricket match who had no idea what was going on but was eager to give the right impression.

‘Hold off for a few more seconds,’ Philippe advised, almost as excited as his son. ‘Now! Start to reel him in. Slowly now, don’t jerk, or he might get off the hook. Easy, that’s it!’

Resisting all temptation to wrest the rod out of his son’s grip, Philippe watched with mounting pride and excitement as Jean-Christophe slowly landed the wildly struggling fish. The excitement even infected Meredith, who watched entranced.

‘I’ll get the net and put it under him. There!’ Philippe closed the net over the fish and raised it out of the water onto the bank.

‘I don’t think it’s the monster,’ Jean-Christophe announced, studying it as it struggled.

‘Maybe not, but it’s pretty damn big!’

Carefully, Philippe undid the top of the net, and Jean-Christophe lifted out the enormous carp. Philippe delved into what seemed to be a bottomless knapsack for some hanging scales. ‘Nearly nineteen kilos! It must be almost a record for the river round here!’