‘OK. So … there are fewer options now,’ said Marcia as she turned over her page. ‘We have Kevin, Bruno, Sam, Michael and Graham. I think we have to have Graham on the list, despite what happened, so that makes five.’

Six, don’t leave Jon off, said some rebellious part of my mind that a more sensible side of me immediately tried to quash.

We finished our drinks, thanked the man for his help, then went back onto the street. Marcia headed straight for the church.

‘But what do you hope to find out?’ I said as I trooped after her. ‘The idea was to see if I felt any sense of familiarity, which I don’t.’

‘We might find a record of the family in the church, if anyone knew them; meet some ancient old priest who baptized the family, married any of them, buried them. We could find their graves.’

‘Billy might not have a grave in this country if he was killed in action.’

‘Grace’s then.’

‘No, finding Billy’s or Grace’s grave, soulmates or not, is a bit too Goth and spooky for me, Marcia.’

‘Well, I’m fascinated even if you’re not,’ said Marcia. ‘I’ve been reading up a lot on reincarnation since we went to India. Some of it makes perfect sense – like one man just couldn’t get into sex with his wife, even though he loved her. It turned out he had been a priest in a past life and had taken a vow of celibacy, so sex felt improper.’

I burst out laughing. ‘Oh come on, Marcia, you don’t really believe that? Sounds like an almighty good excuse for not being able to perform in the bedroom.’

Marcia looked miffed by my reaction. ‘Might be true. There was another case of a woman who was told that her husband had been her brother in a past life; that was the end of their marriage, too.’

I cracked up again. ‘God, I’m loving this. What fabulous, creative excuses to get out of a tricky situation and a great change from the “let’s just be friends” line. You can say, it’s not you, it’s me, I was a nun in a previous life and just can’t do sex; or, so sorry, but I can’t get past the fact that you were my dad in a past life and sex just seems … wrong.’

In the end, Marcia laughed too. ‘I guess when you put it like that, it does sound a bit mad. Maybe that’s why we don’t remember. It would cause way too many problems.’

She opened the small wrought-iron gate and walked through to the church door. She tried the handle. It opened. Inside was cool, calm and quiet. No one appeared to be about and Marcia and I spent a few minutes looking around at the various inscriptions on the walls.