He opened his mouth to object just as I retched without warning and spat into the cardboard bowl. Jensen took it from me, put it in the bin and handed me a tissue and a cup of water.

‘See,’ he murmured. ‘I’m not wasting my time, it’s like having a second doctor in the room.’

Toby shot him an amused glance. ‘In that case there’s a chap in the cubicle next door with a boil that needs lancing, how are you fixed?’

Jensen held up a hand. ‘Sorry. I’m strictly a one patient at a time sort of doctor.’

Toby snorted. ‘That’s called a private hospital.’

After lifting up my eyelids and testing my vision, the doctor perched on the edge of my bed.

‘Right. Before we start any tests, Lottie, there’s a standard question we ask all women of your sort of age: any chance you might be pregnant?’

‘Um.’ I swallowed, determinedly avoiding Jensen’s eye. ‘Technically there’s a chance, I suppose. I mean, I’m not a … I am, I have been sexually active.’

I tried to think calm thoughts to quell the rising heat to my face. On a scale of one to ten, with ten being the most excruciating, I’d just passed eleven …

‘So is that a yes?’ Toby pressed me for an answer.

‘No. Unlikely.’

‘No. Okey-dokey.’

Jensen was now examining a leaflet about head injuries very closely. I wondered who was the most uncomfortable with this discussion. Not Toby, that was for sure.

‘According to the notes from the paramedics,’ he said, scanning the sheet on the clipboard, ‘you stood up too quickly and fainted.’

‘It’s all a bit vague,’ I said. ‘Sorry.’

‘I was there, Doctor,’ said Jensen. ‘It looked as if she was losing consciousness as she stood up, she hit the parasol first and then fell backwards.’

He nodded. ‘Hot day, low blood pressure, it figures. Had you been feeling ill prior to this?’

I hesitated. The truth was that I’d been feeling off-colour since leaving London: loss of appetite, headaches, tiredness, nausea … but I’d put it down to anxiety, particularly after Harvey’s unexpected appearance at Evie’s house.

‘Not really,’ I said uncertainly.

‘Hmm.’ Toby narrowed his eyes. ‘We’ll do a urine test, take some bloods. Then check that head out. Okay?’

Jensen went to fetch a cup of tea while a nurse took me to the toilet in a wheelchair to produce a urine sample. When we got back to the cubicle I convinced her that I was feeling well enough to continue sitting and she left me in a chair while she vanished with my pot of wee.

It was ages before anyone came back and I’d just felt myself nodding off when Jensen appeared with two cups of tea and a big bar of chocolate.