But that was as nothing to what Oliver felt when she hit her teens. Suddenly there was this complex, spotty young woman who had periods and shrugged off her father’s attempts to give her a hug. She was just behaving like any young girl of her age would, but for Oliver it felt like rejection.

And that development coincided with a fall in demand for his work as a cartoonist. Like many freelances, Oliver had always been paranoid about the prospect of the work drying up. And back then, to his mind, that was what was happening. Some fifteen years older than me, he felt that his professional life was over. And so, yes, at one level, Juliet’s behaviour towards him had contributed to his depressive mood.

I didn’t realize that she’d been aware of that. And the idea that she had been bottling up this guilt for more than a decade … it was a painful thought.

‘Daddy was ill,’ I said to her. ‘I’ve felt regret about things I could have done, the fact that I was out at the time he finally decided to do it, but I really haven’t felt guilt. I think I helped him. He would have done it earlier, if he hadn’t got the structure of a family around him, if he hadn’t got people who loved him and were still there when he emerged from the black moods. I think I gave him a bit of stability. Not enough, but a bit. And you did too.’

‘Did I?’ she asked, desperately clutching at any available comfort.

‘Yes, you did. He loved you. That didn’t change. It was just that the hatred for himself became stronger than the love he felt for us.’

‘Hm.’

There was a moment of stasis, the two of us on the sofa bed, my arms around my daughter. One of the buns on top of her head felt strange pressing against my cheek.

Then, abruptly, Jools moved away. ‘I’m not normally soppy like this,’ she said. ‘It’s the booze. And I’m pre-menstrual.’

‘It doesn’t matter why. I’m glad we’ve talked about it.’

‘Huh.’ The brittleness had returned to her tone. ‘I’ll get you some night things. There’s a new toothbrush in the bathroom cabinet.’

I had a fleeting thought that she might keep such a thing for someone she brought back to the flat to stay over, but I didn’t pursue it. Like so many areas of her life, Jools’s relationship history was a closed book to me.

‘Incidentally,’ she asked, ‘will you tell Fleur we’ve had this talk?’

‘My instinct would be not to.’

‘Good. She’d just blather on and on about it and say how you shouldn’t have married Daddy in the first place.’

That was a spot-on assessment of my mother’s likely behaviour, but I was surprised that Jools would voice it. I didn’t think I’d ever before heard her criticize Fleur.

‘She is very grateful for the relationship she has with you, Jools.’

‘Fleur? Oh, she’s easy. I just feed her vanity. It’s easier to be someone else with Fleur than it is to be me with anyone.’