“Of course he’ll come back.” Rex’s voice, slightly milky at the consonants, came with such simplicity she was immediately reassured. Of course Harold would come back. She felt a sudden lightness and wanted to laugh.

Rex passed her a cup. It was delicate china, set on a saucer that matched. She pictured Harold making coffee, the mug full to the brim so that you couldn’t lift it without spilling it first and scalding your hand. Even that seemed funny.

She said, “At first I thought it might be a mid-life crisis. Only, being Harold, he’s doing it rather late.” Rex laughed; a little politely, she felt, but at least the ice was broken. He offered her a plate of party cream biscuits and a napkin. She took a biscuit. She hadn’t realized how hungry she was.

“Are you sure Harold can do this walk?” he said.

“He’s never done anything like it in his life. Last night he stayed in the house of a young Slovakian lady. He didn’t even know her.”

“Good heavens.” Rex cupped his hand under his chin to catch the crumbs from a pink wafer. “I hope he’s all right.”

“I’d say he seems very full of it.”

They smiled and fell into a silence that seemed to set them apart so that they gave another smile, politer this time.

“Maybe we should go after him,” said Rex, “to check he’s all right. I’ve got petrol in the Rover. I could make sandwiches and we might head straight off.”

“Maybe.” Maureen bit her lip, thinking this through. She missed Harold almost as much as she missed David. She wanted to see him very much. But when she imagined the next part, where she caught up with her husband, she floundered. How would she feel, if he didn’t want her after all? If he really was leaving for good? She shook her head. “The truth is, we don’t talk. Not any more. Not properly. The morning he left, I was nagging him about white bread and the jam, Rex. The jam. It’s no wonder he walked off.” She was sad again. She thought of their cold beds, in separate rooms, and the words they shared, which skimmed the surface and meant nothing. “It hasn’t been a marriage for twenty years.”

In the silence, Rex lifted his cup to his mouth, and Maureen did the same. And then he said, “Did you like Queenie Hennessy?”