I ate it warm from the microwave, standing in the kitchen, Bill weaving figures of eight around my ankles. I put the plate in the sink and dusted crumbs of flaky pastry from my boobs. I had things to do.

I hunted under my bed until I found what I was looking for – a carved wooden box that belonged to Cordelia. I put it on the kitchen table and opened the lid.

‘Aha!’ I declared, picking out a tiny pair of pliers. The rest of the box was stuffed with self-seal plastic bags containing long metal pins, hooks and various types of bead: Cordelia’s earring-making kit.

I fetched the green glass necklace I had bought from Pat. I’d cleaned it prior to taking it to the antiques fair so I was able to start work at once, snipping each of the three strings that made up the necklace and letting the beads fall out on to a tray. I picked up three, ascending in size, and threaded them on to a long silver pin, putting a tiny silver bead from Cordelia’s kit in between each one. Bill, who had leapt up on the table, watched with interest as I used the pliers to bend the top of the pin over into a loop and hang it on to the hook that went through the ear. I pinched the loop into place. ‘Voilà!’ I dangled the result in front of him. ‘One earring!’

Over the next two hours I made twenty-four pairs of green glass earrings, using either gold or silver beads to separate the glass ones, varying the design with additional beads from Cordelia’s box. Bill lost interest after whisking a marble-sized bead on to the floor with his paw, chasing it around the kitchen floor and losing it under the fridge, obliging me to fish about among the dust with the handle of a broom. Then he curled up, inconveniently, on my lap.

I was pleased with my night’s work, if a bit boggle-eyed. No two pairs of earrings were the same. And I still had beads from the necklace left over. I also had a stiff neck. I stretched and let down my hair just as the phone rang. It was Paul.

‘Is Nick OK?’ I asked.

‘Yup. He was being careful, wouldn’t open the door to me until I called to him through the letter box.’

‘Did he tell you anything?’

‘I asked him straight out. He was cross with you for talking to me and he clammed up at first. But eventually he opened up a bit, said that he’d dealt with these guys in the past … “moved things on for them”, is how he put it. He said they come down now and again from London to do business with him and he’s never had any trouble with them before.’

‘Well, he was having trouble with them this morning.’