‘She prefers to get her news from her weekly visit to the hairdresser. No doubt that’s where she pinched this.’ Steph held the photo up so the others could see it. It was a glossy chocolate cake shaped like a castle. ‘Ours is going to be shaped like a château, obviously. This château, in fact, so she says can someone email her a very good photo showing all the towers and turrets. She’s already bought those ice-cream cones shaped like witches’ hats to make them.’ Steph shook her head and sighed. ‘I told her it would make far more sense for her to stay with me and make it – or even do it here – but she insisted she had to do it in her own kitchen with her own oven and then drive the thing across France. Madness, if you ask me, but that’s Mum for you.’

Sophie grabbed the photo and held it up, glowing with excitement.

‘Do you know, this cake makes it all seem real.’ She held up her glass of fizz. ‘To our very first château wedding!’

To everyone’s relief, by the next day Meredith seemed back to normal. Whatever worries she had about the sudden arrival of Lucille Latignac had been submerged in getting on with the job.

The first recipient of Meredith’s renewed energy was Steve the builder. Why had he not completed the bedrooms on the first floor? And did he consider the quality of the paintwork to be up to standard? Because she didn’t.

After years of being married to whiplash-tongued Jackie, Steve took this criticism in his stride. ‘As a matter of fact,’ he replied mildly, ‘we’ve been working on the second floor at the same time. If you’d like to inspect it up there, I’d be happy to show you.’

One of Meredith’s strengths, her teams in Hong Kong and Singapore would have attested, was to know when she was behaving unfairly and admit it. That’s what she did now.

‘Sorry. It’s been a demanding week.’

‘That’s all right,’ Steve acknowledged with a cheeky grin. ‘I was almost ready to believe the duchess up at the Lego house that you were the Queen of Bitches for a moment there. Who does she think she is? Just because she’s bought a château she thinks she’s got the status to go with it? I got a right old ear-walloping when I went up there to help her out with installing a new plug socket, I can tell you!’

‘You can tell the duchess I don’t give a toss about status!’ Meredith replied waspishly, then thought better of it. ‘No, don’t say anything. It’ll only make it worse. What am I supposed to have done?’

‘Declaring this festival open, when apparently she should have done it.’