Lulu sighed. “She’s probably right,” she said. “It is a beautiful sweater. Sorry, Soph.”

“Okay,” said Sophie. “All right. I’m glad you like your present, Charlie. And now I’m going to serve the chicken curry, because believe it or not, I’m capable of cooking that, too. Just look at this.”

She walked proudly to the stove, removed the casserole from the top, set it on the table, and with a flourish removed the lid.

A cloud of acrid smoke arose, smelling of burnt onions and charred spices.

Firmly, Lulu replaced the lid and rose from the table.

“I’ll cook some pasta,” she said, beginning to fill a pot with water.

“What on earth is that noise?” said Fee some half hour later as they were consuming Lulu’s hastily prepared meal.

“Mrs. Scott-Ramsay.” Charlie sighed as the now familiar pounding on the floor began.

“She’s getting worse,” said Lulu. “We try to be nice to her, but she won’t have any of it. She doesn’t approve of Charlie because she opened the flat to undesirables like me, and she doesn’t approve of me because … well, I don’t know why, actually, but she doesn’t.”

“I hope you’ve been polite to her,” said Fee.

“Mom!” Lulu glared at her mother. “Of course I’ve been polite to her, I’m not twelve years old anymore! I’m very polite indeed. Sophie’s seen me, haven’t you, Soph?”

“She’s spookily polite,” agreed Sophie. “Unrecognizably polite. It’s actually a little freaky, almost like she’s channeling Emma.”

“You poor man.” Emma addressed herself compassionately to Matthew, who sat smiling quietly, as he usually did at these gatherings: Matthew’s presence was genial, but in company he was not a talker. “Marrying someone who likes to be polite and pleasant and considerate of other people’s feelings. How on earth will you stand it?”

“You’re a brave man, Matthew,” said David. “Marrying in to this bunch. I was telling Claire only this morning that if I didn’t have her, I don’t know what I’d do.”

“Oh, God.” Lulu groaned and shook her head. “Not Claire again, Dad, please, not in public.”

“Claire’s David’s fantasy wife,” Fee told Charlie and Jamie. “She’s his ideal woman. She lives to serve him, only speaks when she’s spoken to, and has no opinions at all about anything whatsoever. I’m quite fond of Claire, in fact—she has a good heart, in spite of her unfortunate breath.”

“I don’t know, Mom,” said Sophie. “Sometimes she gets this sort of gleam in her eye that makes me wonder if she’s plotting something.”

“Don’t encourage them, Sophie,” said Lulu. “We’ve discussed this, it only makes them worse.”

“My Claire wouldn’t know how to plot,” said David proudly. “She doesn’t have two brain cells to rub together, bless her. And I’ve explained about the breath, Fee. She hasn’t had time for the dentist because she’s still too busy monogramming my summer handkerchiefs—she had to throw the last lot out because she’d thought David began with Q. She’s the woman of my dreams,” he added to Matthew.