‘I’m sorry, Mags. I just don’t know what possessed me – can you forgive me? I came down to end my long-running affair with Susan. It is taking a lot for me to say this, but I can see that only the truth is going to help us. I started an affair with her about three years ago. She’s married, but only for convenience – or so I thought. I – I was in love with her, but then I met you and knew what true love really was. I don’t want to lose that, but I have found it hard to break away from Susan. She was prepared to leave her husband for me, and she loves me deeply. I feel such a cad. She is uneducated and is not schooled in the way of being a mistress; she wanted to be my wife, which was always impossible, even if I hadn’t met you, as such a relationship could never have suited me.’

Part of Mags wanted to hit Harold. What did he think he was doing? Making everything right? But then hadn’t she asked for his honesty, and hadn’t she known, deep down, that Susan was an obstacle to their love? If he truly had broken off the relationship, shouldn’t she be rejoicing? Why, then, was she beset by distrust?

‘Did you harbour the thought that you could keep both of us? Me up in Blackburn and Susan down here, amid this . . . this opulent mansion, which you would eventually have told me you had sold?’

‘I have to admit – as you have asked for complete honesty – that I did for a while. I looked on doing so as a solution, rather than as something I desired; and my visits here would have become less and less, until Susan could cope, and then I would have made the break. I wasn’t ever going to move her in here. She was to remain with her husband. I – I was just going to make the break less painful for her, that’s all.’

‘At the expense of my pain. Don’t you see, Harold, that every time you wanted to visit here, you had to conjure up an excuse? And in doing so, you tore me apart emotionally. You made me fight for every morsel of attention. If I didn’t do your bidding, you used that as a reason to run down here to your precious Susan, to soothe her pain, leaving me a wreck. And you made no bones about doing so. I can’t live like that, Harold.’

‘I can only say that I am sorry. I’ve been a fool – I see that now. I’ve hurt you, the last person I ever wanted to hurt. Please give me a chance to make things up to you.’

Part of Mags wanted to go to him, to be held by him and reassured that all would be well in the future, but she was still unconvinced.

‘For someone who wanted to give all this up, you seem to have set yourself up nicely. It appears to me you had every intention of keeping this place forever. You even have a butler who called Susan “Madame”! That’s far above what I would expect to find, in a place you were just doing up to sell.’