‘You know as well as I do, AA’s a shock tactic,’ I told Helena, as the music accompanying the Countdown clock suddenly blared through. ‘Dad knows it too.’

In fact they’d regarded us in abject astonishment, eyes wide like children, when Helena had broached it some time ago.

‘But we’re simply social drinkers!’ Mum had exclaimed, lifting her glass to her lips and getting most of it down her chin.

My father, who was more astute, hadn’t responded, but his frown and small headshake to his eldest child quashed even Helena, who tucked her pamphlet away. My father’s authority was still paramount and absolute. His years on the local bench as a magistrate after four decades in the City at a stockbroking firm and, before that, active military service as a young man, bringing with it a collection of medals, were not to be ignored. And he and his dear lady wife, erstwhile mannequin for Norman Hartnell and appearing in no less than three issues of Vogue in the fifties, were not to be treated as senile dribbling fools, whatever the circumstances.

‘Hels, there’s nothing more we can do,’ I told her gently as I cut the dry bits off the ham. I knew this was anathema to her. Helena thrived on control. ‘We’ve got Irene coming in once a week, and Dad isn’t totally incompetent. We can do no more.’

‘Except hotfoot it down here every time the alarm goes off.’

‘The false alarm, actually. From busybody Cummings. No, I suggest we don’t. I’ll speak to her later and ask her not to overreact again.’

‘Unless, of course, she sees a corpse in the garden.’

‘As long as it is a corpse, and not just Mum and Nance coming round from mild comas on sun loungers like it was before.’

Her mouth twitched. ‘Well, quite.’

She buttered the toast I handed her, the bread being too stale to eat fresh, and then popped in some ham and mustard. We added two glasses of lemon barley water and went back to the sitting room to find them merrily competing over the quiz show.

‘Sensibility!’ roared Dad, who could still do the Telegraph crossword before breakfast. ‘Any fool can see that!’

They took their sandwiches, Mum oohing and aahing about them being cut into triangles, and then ate them with relish, whilst Helena and I discussed who would do a major shop. She would, she decided, since she was here, there being no point going back to the office now. When we’d rustled them up a little fruit salad from a past-its-sell-by assortment in the fruit bowl, we prepared to go. As we got to our feet, Mum declared it a ‘very happy luncheon’, reaching up from her chair to take our hands in girlish delight. Her wide, happy smile glowed, as if we’d just sprung a surprise party on her.