‘It must have been the week when Rickie had a green fit,’ Jocasta said, ‘and wouldn’t let us buy any Sunday papers. Trust him to make me miss out on such important news.’

‘Not important, really,’ said Shona. ‘It’s just celebrity gossip. You wouldn’t mind missing out on that, would you?’

‘This is literary gossip!’ said Jocasta. ‘It’s different! It does matter!’

‘It did matter to the literary festival,’ said Laura, chuckling a little. ‘And he did come and it caused quite a sensation in the literary world. I think he’s still in America, talking about film rights.’ She didn’t know for sure. Eleanora had been rather vague.

‘Well, I know you’re wrong there,’ went on Jocasta, on firmer territory now. ‘There was a big feature some time ago when he said he’d never let his books be filmed. And he hasn’t written anything new for years and years.’ She paused. ‘I looked him up on Wikipedia.’

‘Not a terribly reliable source, if I may say so,’ said one of the other women.

‘Tell you what,’ said Shona, possibly taking pity on Jocasta. ‘I think it’s time for a socking great bit of chocolate cake!’

Jocasta wasn’t grateful. She broke into the general agreement with, ‘Sorry, we don’t do sugar and fat in lethal combinations in this house, although we know Shona’s cake is to die for.’ She smiled in a way that almost earned her a slap. ‘But I have made some flapjacks with millet and just a little organic honey.’

‘How do you know it’s organic honey?’ demanded Shona, who felt slighted in so many ways. ‘Do they tell the bees not to go near flowers that have pesticides on them?’

‘I don’t know,’ snapped Jocasta, getting up. ‘I just buy it. OK!’

While she was gone the other women gathered round Laura. ‘So what about the real Dermot Flynn, then? Is he anything like as wild as they all say he is?’

Laura realised it would be so much easier if she could say, ‘Tell you what, girls, he was a ride!’ Being unable to admit she’d slept with him – for all sorts of reasons – and tell them what a fantastic lover he’d been, she just said, ‘Well, he has a great sense of humour.’

Laura didn’t like being the centre of attention and cursed herself several times over for not keeping her mouth shut. And she went on being unable to keep it shut, too.

‘The thing about Dermot’s books,’ she heard herself saying, ‘is the passion. Never mind the symbolism, the beautiful writing, the prose, just think of the young man’s journey. Do you want to go with him, or not? If you don’t, toss the book aside and read something else.’