The phone’s screen showed 5 per cent, so there should be a call or two left in it and if not, I could get the charger from the office. I dialed the number, but before Charlie could even pick up, there was a shout from down the street. Phyllis was bellowing at the top of her lungs, “Help! Come quickly.”

I ran down the hill as fast as I could and came to a halt at a figure slumped in the doorway of the bookie’s office. It was a woman, chin on her chest, eyes closed as if she had passed out. She was sitting in about four inches of water that had gathered there and Phyllis was kneeling beside her. She lifted the woman’s chin and my heart sank. It was Jude’s daughter, Lissa. Her face was grey, her mouth blue, but it looked as if she was still alive, if only just.

“What’s happened to her?” I asked. “Has someone …”

Phyllis spoke urgently. “I think she’s taken something,” she said, hand on Lissa’s forehead and listening for her breath. She was totally unresponsive. The bookseller pushed at my shoulder. “Go. I’ll stay here with her while you run and fetch Harry.”

Harry’s surgery was just across the street and, though it would be closed now, he lived in the flat above it. I ran splashing through the water, breathless by the time I rang the doorbell, relieved to see that there was a light on upstairs. I pressed the bell and rapped furiously on the door, disconcerted when a female figure appeared through the glass.

Marina.

She opened the door.

“Oh,” I said, taken aback. “I thought you’d gone.”

Not only had I thought she’d gone but she hadn’t appeared for any of the rescue jobs earlier on, although most of the town had got involved. And she hadn’t been at the town meeting, which even the visitors had attended.

She shook her head, looking embarrassed, as if she could tell what I’d been thinking. “I left it too late to go. Are you looking for Harry?”

“Yes.” I nodded, pulling myself together, remembering the emergency at hand. “Someone’s collapsed.” I waved towards the other side of the street. “Over there outside the bookies. Where is Harry?”

“I’m not sure, but I’ll ring him,” she said, pulling her phone from the back pocket of her jeans.

Harry answered straight away. Marina explained what had happened calmly in plain concise language – it appeared she was better in court than on paper – and hung up.

“He’ll be five minutes. He’s just down at the hall giving blood pressure medication to someone who didn’t manage to get theirs out of their house.”