He had insisted that he would taxi me to and from the farm, for the sake of my beautiful car’s suspension and, given that I wanted to get every penny that I could for it in resale value, I was grateful about that.

‘You’re looking good, Tess,’ he smiled, ‘very freckly.’

‘Thanks,’ I smiled back. ‘I’ve spent most of the week chilling on the beach. It’s been a total indulgence and I’m feeling pretty relaxed right now.’

As I had decided to ignore the moments of light-headedness, I didn’t mention them.

‘Oh dear,’ Joe winced.

‘What?’

‘Well, that’s all about to change, I’m afraid,’ he warned me. ‘Say goodbye to blissed out, Tess.’

‘Why?’

‘Because I’ve had to bring Bruce,’ he said apologetically. ‘So, you’d better brace yourself for impact, and an assault on your eardrums, because I’ve got a feeling that he’s going to bark like mad when he spots you.’

And he did. It had been a while since I had seen the loopy mutt and I was pleased that he was secure in the back of the Land Rover and that we were separated by a metal grille and the back seats.

‘Hopefully he’ll have settled down by the time we get to the farm,’ I said to Joe, shouting above the din. ‘Perhaps he won’t be bothered by the time we get out.’

‘Yeah right,’ Joe laughed. ‘Do you want to bet on that?’

Fortunately for my bank balance I didn’t, because even though Charlie was in the yard to meet us and clipped a lead on Bruce before letting him out, the dog still launched into a frenzy of tail thumping, whining and jumping up when he saw me close to.

‘The training’s going well then,’ I laughed.

‘You must be joking,’ said Joe. ‘I reckon he’s beyond help.’

‘He just needs taking in hand,’ I said, eventually managing to pat Bruce’s head as he finally quietened and sat panting at my feet.

‘That’s a job you fancy, is it, Tess?’ asked Charlie.

‘No chance,’ I told him. ‘It’s good to see you again, Charlie.’

‘And you,’ he nodded, then turned to his brother. ‘It’s going to get hot before it breaks, Joe,’ he added, ‘so I’ll keep Bruce with me if you want to show Tess around sooner rather than later.’

I was grateful that I wasn’t going to have to share a tractor cab with the dopey dog and hoped it was air-conditioned because Charlie was right, it was getting hot.

‘Good idea,’ agreed Joe, ‘but don’t worry about this storm. I’ve had a look at the radar and I don’t reckon it’s going to clip us after all.’

‘Yeah, well,’ said Charlie, leading Bruce away, ‘we’ll see about that, won’t we?’

Joe nudged me and we wandered over to the tractor.