Pax set off across the dark, hillocky orchard like a fell runner, aiming for the stile that led to the stud’s wooded boundary through which a half moon was rising to point her way. She dodged trunks and branches, ducking and swerving. Almost there, she tripped over a tree root. In three big, unbalanced steps, she was on her knees and head-butting the hawthorn hedge. Trying to sit up, she rolled backwards and downwards like Alice.

Love and joy come to you! sang the wassailers.

Bad eye smarting, Pax looked up, furious with herself that whilst she rarely ever took a spill drunk, she was flat on her back for the second time in an hour. Did falling in love earn its name because it started this way? she wondered fatuously. Directly above, she could see the distinctive W of Cassiopeia and remembered her grandfather once telling her that Cassiopeia and Cepheus were the only husband-and-wife constellation in all the night sky, the very epitome of growing old together.

‘Are you okay?’ Luca was stooping over her, catching his breath from running. ‘Don’t try to move. Did you hit your head?’

Slow down, heart. ‘Can you see the birds too?’

‘What birds?’ He crouched over her. She could smell the sweetness of the cider on him, the peat of whisky undercutting it. Her mouth watered.

‘The ones flying round singing Disney songs.’

‘Seriously?’ Then he made a ha noise. ‘Are you rolling your eyes? It’s too dark to see down there. You know you’re in a ditch?’ There was an ironic tone she didn’t recognise. He put out a hand to help her up.

‘Just warming it up for you.’ She scrambled out without him, almost treading on the violin abandoned on the bank.

Luca picked it up, plucking a couple of strings. ‘I came to find you to apologise,’ he said, ‘for all the rubbish I said earlier.’

She looked at him, wondering whether he was referring to confessing dishonesty or drunken love. Maybe they amounted to the same thing.

The big bonfire had just been lit, the smell of burning apple logs drifting in smoke through frosting air, golden light spilling far enough to illuminate the orchard clearly.

‘Hey, Paddy, we need music!’ demanded an unseen voice across the field.

Ignoring it, Luca tilted his head, able to see her face now. ‘You’ve hurt your poor eye.’

‘It’s not painful,’ she lied.

He put his hand on her face, unexpectedly warm. ‘Let me look, angel.’ He brushed his thumb lightly across her cheekbone and over her brow.

She’d never heard Luca call anyone angel before. She wanted to clamp her arms around herself to stop everything fluttering inside so much, giving her away. How warm were his fingers?

‘Close your eye a minute.’

She felt the heat of his thumb crossing her lid, yet it didn’t seem to touch her. It should have made her flinch, but it didn’t. Was it her imagination or did the eye feel less angry? He did it again, more slowly. It felt amazing. That warmth.