Bram gives a shrug, then a smile, then snatches up my hand and kisses it quickly. We can hear approaching children and the dog, and before they can reach us he leads me swiftly away, up the stairs to his rooms. Even in my good new coat and fur hat I can feel the temperature drop as we enter the attic space. The fact is, there is very little warmth on the ground floor, and none at all in the bedrooms, and what heat might remain to drift upward simply continues its journey through the frozen slates or holes in the roof. As Bram bustles about boiling a kettle for tea I can see his breath forming small clouds in front of him. He glances at me, clearly unsurprised to see I have not removed my coat.

“I’m sorry,” he says. “It is horridly cold up here.”

“The tea will warm us.”

“If I can ever get this blasted gas to light, the matches are so damp … there. Shouldn’t take too long.” He leaves the kettle and hurries back to wrap me in his strong arms. “It is ridiculous that I subject you to this,” he murmurs into my hair.

“There is no place on earth I would rather be.”

“There is nothing in the least bit romantic about pneumonia,” he warns, “which is what we shall both soon have if we are obliged to hide ourselves away in the roof like, oh, I don’t know, a pair of mice.”

“Bats,” I tell him. “I would rather we were bats.” I smile up into his lovely face. “The cold doesn’t matter. Nothing matters.” For a long moment we say nothing but gaze at each other, reveling in the embrace. He kisses the very tip of my nose.

“I’ll bet you couldn’t even feel that, your poor dear nose is so frozen.”

“Better kiss me again, then.”

He does, but not my nose. This time he puts his lips to mine and I melt into the blissful closeness of a long, luxurious kiss. The heavenly moment is pierced by the shrill cry of the kettle. Bram lets me go, grinning. He pushes his unruly hair out of his eyes and claps his hands together, rubbing them in a businesslike fashion.

“Tea,” he says, hurrying back to his task. He fills the pot and puts a little milk and sugar in the cups. He is careful to shut the sugar tin and milk away in the shabby metal cupboard where he stores his comestibles. He gives the tea in the pot a stir before pouring it with a flourish from some height.

“Do you know, until I met you I had never seen a man make tea.”

“I’m happy to hear I have added so significantly to your life experiences.”

“Particularly with the tea making.”

“Particularly.”