"Cursed?"

"Yes. Two unexplained deaths, a madness. It didn't take much."

"Blimey. I hope it isn't."

"Why? What are you worried about then? Death or madness?"

He felt like saying just plain old adultery actually. "Death isn't exactly in my life plan. But places do have their own vibes, don't they?"

"No, I don't think so. I think the vibes are just about the people who are living in it at the time."

"Is that what you think?"

"Yes, that's what I think."

We're flirting with each other, he realized. "Well, I'd live here," he said.

"In your dreams."

He didn't want to think too hard about his dreams, either, so he opened the cream folded sheet of paper that he had picked up from inside the porch. "It says here that after the deaths Charles Pencarrow diverted all his wealth to the rebuilding of Saint Peter's Church across the valley."

"Oh, you should go to Saint Peter's if you can. It has this fabulous sculptured granite facade."

"You've been?" She nodded. She didn't tell him it was on a school trip six years ago.

"We could go together?" he suggested tentatively.

"Sure."

"That would be great. It's so good, finally meeting someone who's interested in the same things as I am."

"Oh, it's nothing."

And the way she said it, he really should have realized that she meant it.

"What about clapshot?" Sita said.

"No, I've never had that. Is it treatable?" Emmy asked, fishing carrots and the green parts of the leek out of the ham pot.

Sita laughed. "It's something you can make from rutabagas and potatoes. Look." She pointed at a recipe in a book called Hearty Vegetable Dishes.

"Good grief! Who the hell would eat anything called clapshot?"

"Somebody who had a surfeit of rutabagas and potatoes?"

"Oh yeah!"

They were both a little drunk and Emmy had been tutoring Sita in the newly discovered techniques of phone sex.

"I think you should do it today," said Emmy. "Strike while the iron's hot."

"Wouldn't that burn?"

Their loud cackles were more or less unconscious now, but if they still traveled upstairs that was a bonus. If he heard them, Niall might wish he were downstairs instead.

"God knows we could do with a touch of originality," said Sita.

"Oh, you don't touch, and it's not very original. This is the age of the mobile, remember."

"It would be original for us."

"From what you've just told me, any sex would be original for you."

"This is true. Shall I phone him now?"

"He might have lime putty on his hands. Very caustic, I've heard. It can cause blindness. And don't you think that would be biting off more than you can chew?"

"I've never been able to do that, either. What do you do with your teeth?"

"Take 'em out, leave 'em in a glass of water on the side."

"It'll come to that sooner than we think."

"I know. My gums have already started bleeding when I clean my teeth."

"Stop," Sita said, making a disgusted face. "That's too much information, even for a doctor. Anyway, that's not caused by old age, that's down to careless brushing. Let's go back to phone sex a minute. Give me an opening line."

"You don't need me to tell you what to say."

"Oh but I do."

"Well, it can be anything, can't it? Just make sure you choose your words carefully-some words don't work."

"Like what? I need an example."

"Okay. 'Probing.'"

"Uuugh!"

"Or the 'c' word."

"I wouldn't say that anyway."

"And men don't like 'prick.'"

"I don't suppose they do!"

"So why do they like 'dick?'"

"Do they?"

"Don't they? I thought they did."

"I don't know, do I?"

Emmy filled their glasses with the last of the champagne. "Can you remember what-"

"Don't! I know what you're going to say and just don't!"

"Fingerbob!"

"I said don't! I'd forgotten him!"

They were dribbling helplessly, with tears streaming down their faces, and neither of them noticed when Niall walked in, barefoot. He checked the empty champagne bottle and decided not to mention how much it cost. It was worth every penny, anyway.

"Get on with sorting the clapshot, you old tart," Emmy snorted to Sita, rolling the rutabaga at her.

It was too good a line for Niall to ignore. "I thought you weren't on duty today, Sita."

"Oh, God! How long have you been there?" shrieked Emmy, spinning round. Her face was flushed with alcohol.

"Ages. I heard the whole lot." It was a fair bet. He knew what they were like.

"You liar."

"I did. And you're both filthy. You should be ashamed of yourselves."

"We are. Deeply."

"Well," said Sita, scraping her chair across the slate floor and picking up her mobile from the dresser. "Will you excuse me? I've got a phone call to make."

"You aren't, are you?" Emmy asked her.

"I am."

"Is nothing sacred?" said Niall, not really minding that he had clearly been discussed, and pointing to Emmy's shoulder to try and tell her about the pen.

"You all need to leave room for my delicious pudding," Kat reminded everyone. But fingers kept creeping back to the platter to have one more go at picking up the last few chunky flakes of rich pink meat, or to the chipped floral serving dish for some of the burned onions left from the clapshot.

She had spent the late afternoon spoiling Emmy and Sita's fun with her presence, and creating a complicated chocolate orange souffle with ingredients from a selection of cappuccino-colored paper bags tied with gold ribbons. The bags still sat by the organic vegetable cardboard box next to the kitchen sink, making a statement similar to the one being made under the table by her high snakeskin-effect mules and Emmy's flat clogs.

"I'm not sure I could eat another thing," Emmy said, the ballpoint message still on her shoulder blade but hidden by a lime-green velvet wrap with a fringe of purple beads she had made for the occasion.

"Oh, you must."

Maya dipped her spoon in and licked it. "It's actually really yum!"

"There's loads of alcohol in it."

"How much?" Jonathan asked nervously.

Kat shrugged helplessly. "Oh, loads. I didn't think about the children."

"I'll have some," Jay shouted from the far end. He and Scott had already seen off two cans of beer each and he liked the Dutch courage it gave him. What's more, his banner had worked. He and Scott had hung it from the Welsh dresser, weighted down at the top by the contents of the larder. Everyone had cheered when he finally allowed them into the kitchen. He'd even let his mother kiss him.

"Arm-wrestle me, Dad."

"No. You'll beat me."

"Arm-wrestle me, Niall."

"No. I'll break your finger bones."

"A game of snooker, then?"

"We haven't got enough balls."

"Speak for yourself," Jay shouted bravely, basking in Scott's adoring admiration. "C'mon Scottie, let's go."

Sita and Jonathan smiled at each other side by side on the settle.

"Did you get my message at lunchtime?" she asked him under her breath.

"Yes. I didn't get back because I was already on my way."

"Pity."

"Why? What did you need me for?"

"You wouldn't believe me if I told you."

"Why not?"

"You just wouldn't."

"Try me." He wasn't sure but he thought he caught something in her eye he hadn't seen for a very long time.

"Phone sex," she whispered.

He looked around to see who was in on the joke. No one seemed to be. "Yeah, right. Don't tell me, Lila had run out of nappies and you wanted me to stop off at the shop."

"No, really."

"Really?" he asked. He was also whispering now.