‘You see now why I was so desperate for information when I called you? At least then…’ My voice splintered, emotion overwhelming me now. ‘At least then I could still talk to her. Hold her. You have no idea how hard it is to be physically separated from your child.’ Pain and anger were flooding me now. ‘When I saw her after that terrible retreat, I tried to take her in my arms, to hug her back to her senses, but it was like she’d been possessed.’

I could see Deborah wrestling with what I was telling her.

‘Lily, I’m not dismissing what you’re saying, but so many of us have seen such good results. Anorexia, cutting, depression – all these things this generation of girls seem to suffer from the way we suffered with acne! Amber seems like some kind of whisperer for their neuroses.’

My heart was pounding in my chest, my eyes narrow. ‘The police can arrest me for calling my own child – my broken, beloved child – and telling her how much I love her, Deborah. How can a person who has done that to a mother be anything but evil?’

Deborah looked helpless, clinging on desperately to her narrative. ‘She must think that she’s helping! I’m not saying she is, but… I do believe she’s a good person.’

I felt my skin flush, then bleach, my right hand held tightly between my knees to stop it reaching across the table unbidden and dashing itself across her weather-beaten face. A mangy ginger cat unfurled himself from a rattan basket, and I dropped my fingers down, making a chirruping noise.

‘What a beautiful moggy!’ I said, feeling the tension drop.

‘Isn’t he handsome?’ Deborah gratefully agreed, an eternal optimist in all possible areas. ‘He’s a rescue.’

‘So there are others?’ I said, lightly, stroking the piebald fur on the top of his head. One of his ears was missing its pointy tip. He pushed his weight against me, purring as needily as his hopeless owner. ‘You know plenty of other people who’ve encountered her, it sounds like?’ I dropped to my knees, so I was level with the cat. This was what we needed – corroboration. I couldn’t let righteous fury destroy this opportunity. ‘What’s he called?’

‘Mr Stuffins,’ said Deborah, face wreathed with smiles, like he was her firstborn, receiving his doctorate from Oxford University. ‘And yes. I mean – you’ve been quite out of touch with all of us St Johns mums the past few years.’

‘Have I?’ I said, sharper than I intended. ‘I feel like we’ve all drunk our fair share of Sauvignon Blanc on the Askew Road?’

Deborah looked shifty. ‘Yeah, no, of course. But you’ve built such an incredible business, Lily, while we’ve all just been bobbing along.’