‘I’ll never get over it so long as I lives!’ she exclaimed. ‘Not nor Mr Barrow neither, come to that! Pretendin’ as if you was dead an’ gone, Carla Hahn! Sending all them poor folk foolish enough to give a hoot about you quite doolally!’

‘I wasn’t pretending anything, Mrs Barrow,’ (I commenced a pathetic attempt to defend myself) ‘I was just sitting outside on the balcony, waiting to have a word with Mr Huff …’ I pointed, poignantly. ‘And I honestly had no idea – none – that the bungalow in Fairlight …’

‘I came straight over an’ searched this place myself!’ Mrs Barrow insisted. ‘I even gave that there poor rabbit a carrot.’

She pointed – with a folded-up newspaper – at the rabbit who (Oh dear. First blood to the Prosecutor!) was still in cheerful possession of a good half of said vegetable, then tossed the paper towards me, contemptuously (intending that I replace the old used stuff, I suppose).

‘I was here, Mrs Barrow,’ I insisted (kneeling down to do her bidding).

Mrs Barrow just scowled.

‘Although …’ I grimaced, trying to piece it all together as I lifted the fireguard off the rabbit and quickly grabbed it, ‘my bike had a slow puncture, so I came down from Fairlight mostly on foot. Maybe I hadn’t even made it to the cottage by the time you …?’

‘The whole sky awash with searchlights!’ Mrs Barrow exclaimed. ‘We’ve not seen nothing like it around these parts since the war! An’ poor Rusty blubbin’ his heart out on the phone at all hours. Your poor dad in hysterics I shouldn’t wonder! Mr Barrow up at dawn trawlin’ the beaches searching for your battered corpse. Shame on you, Carla Hahn!’

‘I really am very sorry, Mrs Barrow,’ I sighed, kissing a rabbit ear (trying to dispel the curious image of my corpse preserved – for all eternity – in a lightly fried cornflour coating).

‘Well that’s as been a most scandalous waste of time and energy!’ Mrs Barrow persisted. ‘A scandalous waste!’

‘I’m very sorry, Mrs Barrow,’ I repeated (mushy peas, giant portion of chips. A vinegar bottle the size of a carthorse to the side …).

‘Can you imagine what all that dreadful commotion will’ve cost the local taxpayer?’ Mrs Barrow wondered. ‘An’ what if some other poor soul in mortal danger had been in want of them same human resources, but they was all took up by searching for such as the likes of you, Carla Hahn?!’

‘That would’ve been a terrible tragedy,’ I conceded, standing up and plopping the rabbit into a large mixing bowl.

‘Some real emergency. Like a fire in a care-home. Or a gas explosion on a maternity ward. Or a boat full of disadvantaged little ’uns on a sightseeing trip suddenly capsizes!’

‘An awful thought.’ I nodded, preparing to replace the paper on the floor and then thinking better of it (Clifford had gone to the trouble of bringing the new hutch over, after all).