‘Darling, where will you put all your stuff? Is that all you’ve got? Love, I know you are a lot younger than me, but you need a bit more than just a pot of Astral, surely? What about cleanser and toner?’

Thea, who was amazed at how much it took to make Molly look like Molly, felt she might as well come clean. ‘I don’t do much in the way of cleansing and toning. I just smear on some cream, wipe it off with loo paper and put a bit more on.’

Molly was horrified. ‘I can’t believe anyone, in this day and age, doesn’t cleanse and tone.’ She peered at Thea. ‘Well, you seem to have got away with it so far, but it could rebound on you horribly. You have to take care of yourself, Thea …’

Before Molly could finish her thought, which Thea knew from experience was something on the lines of ‘or you’ll never find yourself a man’, Thea broke in, ‘I do have deodorant with moisturiser in it. It makes my armpits wonderfully soft and manageable.’

Molly pursed her lips. She was a natural matchmaker and, sensing this, when they first met, Thea had given her a very graphic and well-dramatised account of her break-up with Conrad. Otherwise, Thea had felt at the time, and had no reason to change her mind since, Molly would be dragging single men out of the woodwork until, maddened by boredom, Thea put herself into a convent.

Now, Thea looked at her watch. ‘We’ve got three-quarters of an hour before we have to meet downstairs for dinner.’

‘Really? Oh, my God! Do you mind if I have the bath first? What are you going to wear?’

Thea didn’t have a lot of choice. ‘Something navy-blue, I expect.’

Gerald was impatiently striding up and down the hotel foyer, waiting for the last of his flock to arrive when they got down the stairs. He wanted to march them briskly off to dinner. ‘Late again, Molly! I thought I’d taught you a bit of punctuality when you were with me before.’

‘It was my fault,’ Thea began, sacrificing truth for her friend. But then she saw Molly bridling happily under Gerald’s stern admonishment and realised she liked it. In any case, no one would believe that she had spent more than ten minutes doing herself up, when her hair was still slightly wet and her navy-blue skirt distinctly crumpled.

‘Oh, Gerald, you’re such a bully,’ said Molly. ‘I don’t know why I come with you.’

As the party processed down the narrow street to the restaurant, Thea wondered if Molly would like it if Derek were as masterful as Gerald and decided not. It was one thing to enjoy being bossed about by Gerald for five days on holiday, but quite another actually to live with someone you couldn’t control.