‘Of course we forgive you,’ her mother told her with tears in her eyes. ‘If you’re happy then we’re happy. You’re both home safe and sound and that’s all that matters. Congratulations. I know you’re both going to be very happy, my darling. And, John, you wouldn’t happen to have another bottle of champagne, would you? We might have missed the wedding but there’s nothing to stop us drinking a toast to the happy couple, is there?’

‘Indeed, there isn’t,’ he agreed. ‘I shall go down into the cellar this very minute, just carry on chatting without me. I’m not as quick on my pins as I used to be.’ He pottered away with a wide smile on his face. It wasn’t the sort of wedding he’d always envisaged for his only grandson, admittedly, but he couldn’t have been happier with his choice of bride and that was all that mattered.

Much later that evening when the newlyweds had retired to bed, Sunday and John sat in the kitchen enjoying a last hot drink together when suddenly, to Sunday’s surprise, he reached across the table and tenderly took her hand.

‘Now don’t get going all soppy on me again just because we’ve got the newlyweds home,’ she warned with a little grin. Since the night John had made the marriage proposal to her so long ago, he had behaved like the perfect gentleman. But she needn’t have worried.

‘I wasn’t about to,’ he assured her with a grin. ‘But what I do want to do is let you know that you and your family – or our family I should say now, shouldn’t I? – have come to mean a very great deal to me. I’m thrilled with the way things have turned out for all our children and I want to thank you most sincerely for all you’ve done for me.’

‘I think it’s more a case of what you have done for me,’ Sunday told him. ‘But why are you getting all sentimental on me?’ That strange sense of foreboding that sometimes came over her had crept up on her again and it was unsettling.

‘I just wanted you to know that I think of you as my dearest friend. And now we shall change the subject, my dear.’

Soon after, they both retired to bed but for some reason Sunday’s mind was working overtime and she tossed and turned all night.

She rose at dawn the following morning and for no reason that Sunday could explain she went to tap on John’s door.

‘John … John are you awake?’ There was no answer, so she tapped again, slightly louder this time.