‘Isn’t he?’ I agree, and close my eyes. ‘Especially when Clare tricks him out in the very baby clothes of Casimir’s I’d given her and brings him to his father’s party for his first public outing.’ A silence falls between us, as I recall the shock of seeing Cas/Joe aged eighteen months in Clare’s arms, wearing Cas’s old brown cords and the navy jersey that my own mother had knitted, and what I felt was a look of secret triumph on the other woman’s face. And the Paddington Bear wellies.

‘Of course I’ll tell the children about Joe,’ I say. Though I haven’t yet convinced myself. I can’t think how I would break the news. ‘Darlings, er, Daddy and I have something to tell you! It’s a lovely surprise! Do you remember Clare, from Lonsdale Gardens? Well, isn’t it lovely! Clare couldn’t have a baby with Gideon, so she asked Daddy very nicely, and…’

I can’t go on, even rehearsing the conversation. It is too gruesome. On so many levels. Not even Posy would buy it. Not for a second. And as for Mirabel…

I’m feeling very tired. When Ralph and Rose ask me why I’m so tired, I tell them it is the heat, the jetlag, the stress. We are always being told how tiring stress is. And how stressful.

‘I’ll tell them, when I feel up to it.’ I lever myself up off the lounger, and slide into the tepid oblivion of the pool.

Rose

Cath Cobb is natty in a khaki suit and Tod’s loafers, the ones where the studded rubber sole lips over the back of the shoe, drinking what she calls a seltzer and lime. Mimi is in wellies and jeans and her Husky over a baggy checked man’s shirt (vodka and tonic), still looking brown and streaky-haired from Jamaica. And much happier, thank God. Her cheeks are rosy, and she is wolfing a packet of cheese and onion crisps. I never feel hungry, particularly, so I find myself rather envious not only of Mimi’s lusher figure but also her appetite.

Sir Michael Hutton (Scotch, no ice) is with Lady Elizabeth (sherry). Granville is supposed to be arriving by helicopter, according to Cath, with Kasmin, the famous art collector, and his wife, Pernilla, the telly cook, who are coming for the weekend. Sophy (spicy tomato juice) is here from Spodden’s Hatch, wearing an assortment of darned clothes, like a Cabbage Patch doll, which, worryingly, look as if she might have made them. And there are loads of others.