‘Brilliant,’ Jo said, taking a seat on her mum’s chair and covering a yawn with her hand. Apart from the hour she’d spent perched on the uncomfortable pew in the village church that morning, listening as the boring vicar droned on and on for what had felt like an eternity, this was the first time she’d sat down all day.

‘Your mum arranged everything in advance, so I can’t take any credit,’ said Frank. ‘If I’d had my way, she’d have had nothing but the best, but she made me promise I wouldn’t change anything, so my hands were tied.’

As he spoke, his gaze drifted to a framed photograph on the mantelpiece. It had been taken on his and Maureen’s wedding day, and she’d looked like a beauty queen with her long blond hair in curls, and her sapphire eyes sparkling with the joy of being a new bride. Her physical appearance had changed after moving out here; her smooth skin coarsened by the unforgiving weather of the countryside, her waistline expanded from the hearty meals she’d cooked. That extra weight had dropped off her at an alarming rate in the months following her cancer diagnosis, but her fighting spirit had stayed to the bitter end, and they’d had some blazing rows over her refusal to take the course of chemo she’d been offered. ‘What’s the point?’ she’d argued when Frank had begged her to go for it. ‘We’re all going to die eventually, and I don’t want to waste whatever time I’ve got left being pumped full of poison that’ll make me even sicker than I already am.’

‘Are you all right, Dad?’ Jo’s voice pierced Frank’s thoughts.

‘Just thinking what a stubborn woman your mother was,’ he sighed.

‘She certainly knew how to keep you in your place,’ said Evan. ‘And me, come to that. As tiny as she was, I didn’t dare answer back when she told me off. That’s why I was always out in the fields with you.’

‘Pity you didn’t keep it up,’ Jo sniped. ‘If he’d had more help since his heart attack, he might not have had to retire so early.’

Evan’s grin evaporated and he fixed his sister with an accusing glare. ‘I didn’t see you offering to give him a hand.’

‘I’ve got Emily to look after,’ she reminded him. ‘And you’re their son, so it was your job. Anyway, you live closer.’

‘I’ve already got a job, and a disabled wife.’