‘Yes.’ Merrin’s voice was no more than a murmur. Granny Ellen and Guthrie . . . It was a lot to comprehend, shocking, and she wondered how she had never questioned how humble fishermen had come to be the owners of this lovely building and the little trawler that had no debt.

‘Ellen – the girl who married a Kellow, who gave birth to Ben and never left Port Charles,’ Loretta surmised.

‘I . . . I don’t know what to say.’ Her thoughts came thick and fast.

‘Guthrie never forgot his first love and when he died I found this in a book of verse by his bed.’ She reached again into her pocket and produced a small black-and-white photograph that she handed to Merrin. It was of her gran, Ellen Bligh; she was smiling with eyes lit up in a way Merrin had never seen before, beautiful.

‘Look at the back,’ Loretta instructed. Merrin turned it over and read the calligraphy.

‘I would not wish any companion in the world but you.’ William Shakespeare.

‘So was it revenge, Loretta?’ Her tone was kindly despite the nature of her question. ‘Did you want to spoil Ellen’s granddaughter’s life because Ellen seemed instrumental in destroying Guthrie’s?’

‘Maybe a little bit at first.’ The woman’s eyes misted. ‘But then I realised you two were in love and I did my best to make things perfect.’

‘But then?’ Merrin asked with emotion.

‘I could see that my son wasn’t ready. Was too young, immature, and so I asked him which he would choose: you or our money. It was a test. Guthrie would have given up every penny he owned for Ellen.’

‘But Digby chose the money.’ Merrin spoke with a crack to her voice, her distress not at the loss of him, not any more, but at the whole bloody mess and all the heartache that their love affair had caused.

The two women sat in silence with their thoughts.

‘Is there anything else you want to say, Loretta?’ Merrin braced herself for more revelations.

‘Yes.’ She sat up in the chair and straightened her pearls. ‘Do you have any wine?’

‘Oh! I do, somewhere.’ She walked to the cardboard box in the corner and fished out a bottle of red, rinsed the mugs in the bucket and gave Mrs Mortimer a slug of warm red in an old tea mug before lighting a candle and sitting down with her own.

‘So what now, Loretta? Do I need to give you this place back? Is it rightfully yours? Is that what you’re saying? How about the Sally-Mae?’ Her jaw was tense, her tone firm, and she decided in that moment that if that were the case, she would do it and she would survive. After all, she’d been through worse.