‘Was the car damaged though? I mean, if he went through the windscreen …’

‘Knowing the details won’t bring him back,’ said Pat, looking down the road in the hope of seeing the sturdy, familiar shape of the bus. She sighed and checked her watch. ‘I’m starting to worry about getting back.’

‘You haven’t got there yet.’

‘The bus will come. But what if there’s no bus back? I’ll have to stay over with Meg and that’ll lead to blood on the walls.’

I managed a smile. Pat and her sister had never seen eye to eye, though when I said as much to John he told me it were due to the fact that Pat was a wee thing and Meg was a tall, long-limbed creature. We would have never said it in company but there was always a few suspicions about whether their mam had stayed entirely faithful to her old fella when he was away in the merchant navy before the first war.

‘Who you got today?’ I asked.

‘Mr and Mrs Dolan at Talkin. He’ll pick me up in Brampton but said he wouldn’t come all this way. Thinking of the mud on his Rolls Royce if you ask me.’

‘Is that what he drives?’

‘I don’t know. Looks posh though. Not as posh as the brothers drive at the hall though. He hasn’t got their manners neither.’