“So let’s get this straight,” said Lulu, watching her sister make healthy inroads into the remains of the brunch. “Your flatmate’s sister is not very nice, but she’s getting married …”

“Can you believe it?” Sophie swallowed a quarter of a bagel and waved the rest incredulously. “She met him at a rally for peace in Outer Northeast Bora-Bora or somewhere, which is actually heavy on the dramatic irony because she’s the least peaceful person I know, and love bloomed, and it’s this big whirlwind romance and they’re gadding off next week to pull out all the stops at Waltham Cross Registry Office with half a glass of shandy and a jacket potato afterwards. And he’s nice! At least, he seems nice, but all I can say is he must be mad, because she’s really, really, and I mean really—”

“We don’t all find everyone easy to be with, sweetie,” said Fee. “But even difficult people do find partners.”

“I’m still waiting,” remarked Emma mildly, “to find out exactly how this affects you.”

“How it affects me?” said Sophie. She took another bite of bagel and shook her head in disbelief at her sisters’ slowness of uptake. “Don’t either of you get it? When she moves in with him, she’ll be moving out of her flat. And the deal’s always been that if or when she moved out of her flat, then Esme would move in to take her place. Which means that Esme will be moving out of our flat, which means that I’m out on the street.”

“But can’t you get another roommate?” said Fee. “It’s a small place, but at that rent surely someone would want it.”

“Well … kind of a problem there, Mom,” said Sophie. “The flat was sort of a private arrangement between Esme and me.”

“Private arrangement?” Emma hooked her chair in to the table and rested an interested chin on her hand. “What might that mean, exactly?”

Sophie sighed and looked with disfavor on her sisters.

“Do you two have to be here for this part?” she said. “Don’t you have a cauldron that needs stirring or something?”

“Oh, no, no,” said Emma. “We’ve got all day for this one, haven’t we, Lulu?”

“I’m all ears,” said Lulu.

“Okay.” Sophie sighed again. “Well, we didn’t do anything bad or anything. It’s just that the landlady is a friend of Esme’s parents, and when Esme moved in, she did say that she could have friends to stay, and I am a very good friend of Esme’s, so, well, I just stayed there a lot.”

“Although it was officially only a flat for one person,” said Fee. “Oh, Sophie, you know that was wrong.”

“We didn’t do anything illegal, Mom,” said Sophie. “And I was a model tenant—I kept the place in much better shape than Esme did, actually. And Mrs. Powell really liked me. We met a couple of times when she came to visit. She thought I was Esme’s friend down to stay from the North.”