Another mile or so, and we reached the row of red-brick terraced cottages that preceded the Water Boatman. As we wound back towards the water, tired and hot from the walk, the riverside pub garden appeared idyllic.

‘A table in the sunshine or the shade?’ I asked, already eyeing up an empty picnic bench sitting in a pool of sunlight.

‘I was thinking table inside.’ Daniel glanced warily across the water towards the Old Boat House, where every table appeared packed with a mix of families and couples out enjoying the warmer weather.

‘Seriously?’ I looked at him, surprised. ‘Are you ashamed to be seen at the Boatman?’ And then another realisation struck. ‘Or ashamed to be seen with me? The incomer who swaggered in with her grandiose saviour complex and attempted to rectify decades of devastation with a cheese and wine evening?’

‘Either that or I’ve been mates with the manager of the Old Boat House since I was four, and two days ago I met with him to pitch Damson Farm Cider. I promised him first dibs.’

‘Okay, I can see how you now turning up here could be misconstrued.’

A man around Daniel’s age, who looked as though he had sampled more than a bellyful of beer in his time, currently stood on the far side of the river, hands on hips, a knowing tilt to his head.

‘Gavin,’ Daniel called, with a half-hearted wave.

‘Danny.’ Gavin nodded back, folding his arms, bar towel dangling from one elbow.

‘Just calling in to see Eleanor’s friend. She works here.’

‘Alice Munroe.’ He sneered Alice’s name as though it was a euphemism for a pub toilet.

‘Right. Great to see you.’ Daniel turned to me, jaw set. ‘Let’s eat at that table in the sunshine. If he’s got that much of a problem with it, I’ll take the cider I haven’t even grown the apples for yet elsewhere.’

‘Okay.’ I gave an internal sigh of relief that he’d seen sense.

I fetched us drinks and menus from inside, saying a quick hello to Alice, who was busy serving plates of sandwiches to the Ferrington Foxes football club. Luke gave me a brief nod, which I guessed was his equivalent of someone else running over and throwing their arms around me.

A few minutes later Alice came to find me in the garden.

‘Well, this is cosy.’ She bent down to give Hope a kiss. ‘Nice to see you venturing over to the dark side, Daniel.’

‘Your words, not mine.’

‘Becky told me the news.’ She threw me a wink.

‘What news is that?’ Daniel asked.

‘Dating, kissing… For what it’s worth, I agree with Becks that if you’re going to take a man like Daniel off the market, the least you can do is make the most of it. Men like him are all too rare.’

Daniel looked momentarily surprised, before burying a grin behind his bottle of cider.

‘They aren’t that rare,’ I replied, pointedly. ‘Amazing women, like, ooh, I don’t know, you for instance, have no reason to be settling for a man who is any less than equally as amazing.’