Later, Romy sat on the sofa in the high-ceilinged sitting room, the large sash windows facing out towards the sea. She was all cried out. Bettina sat beside her. She had listened intently, but said very little as Romy revealed the twists and turns of her story.

‘Hmm,’ she said eventually. ‘It’s unbelievably unfair, Grace turning out to be Finch’s stepdaughter, to say the least.’ Romy didn’t reply and it was a while before Bettina continued. ‘Walk away, is my advice. From the lot of them.’

‘I don’t have much choice. Finch will choose Grace over me every time. She’s Nell’s daughter. I should have trusted what she said from the start.’

‘You’ve never met the girl. Why would you do that?’

‘Tell that to Finch,’ she said sadly.

‘It’s such a muddle.’ Bettina let out a frustrated breath. ‘I mean, if Michael came clean, explained what really happened …’

‘It’s pathetic, but I can’t even bring myself to have the conversation with him.’

‘Why not?’

‘Because – because – I don’t know. Maybe I don’t want to hear what he has to say.’

Her friend absorbed this, then gave a shrug. ‘Do you have to know? Can’t you just leave it in the past, where it belongs?’ She grabbed her hand. ‘None of these people – including Michael – is your responsibility, Romy. Get a good carer-housekeeper person and move on with your life.’

‘I’m trying, believe me. You saw the sorry bunch of candidates last time.’ Romy felt suddenly fed up with herself and her whingeing. ‘Listen, can we just go down to the sea and forget about the whole bang shoot? I want to drink too much wine and sleep like the dead and never let the names Michael or Grace or Finch darken my lips ever again.’

It must have been around midnight that Romy finally threw herself down on Bettina’s beautifully laundered cotton sheets. Jost had come back from the shop in time for supper. Tall and lean, tanned, with a longish mop of fading brown hair, he was a man with a soft smile, who said very little. Bettina was the extrovert and it was she who wooed the customers, who knew all about their likes and dislikes, their ailments and allergies, their children and grandchildren, the names of their dogs tied up to the hooks outside. Jost did the baking, catering to the London crowd who had migrated to Hastings and craved pricey artisan loaves – stone-baked, sourdough, seeds, rye flour – and gluten-free cakes.

The day had been muggy, the temperature barely dropping as evening approached, and too hot to cook, so they’d eaten cold chicken and Caesar salad, no one saying very much, the silence easy between old friends. Romy, however, had been drinking for a large part of the day, her glass constantly topped up by Bettina. By the time she fell into bed, she was dizzy with it.