‘I’m sorry, that wasn’t funny.’

‘No, I’m just being over-sensitive. It was a mistake for me to start talking about the past. It reminded me that I promised myself that by the time I was thirty my name would be in lights.’

‘Don’t you talk about the past normally?’

‘Who with? Not Nikki, it would be too painful for her. And why would the tenants be interested? They come and go.’

He had a sudden vivid picture of her isolation, the burdens she was carrying alone.

‘Did you come back to live here after you broke up with your husband?’ he asked.

‘Yes, I couldn’t have stayed in London. For one thing it was too expensive, and for another he-well, I suppose he bribed me to go away. He was becoming fairly well known in showbiz. He didn’t want to risk the “beautiful people” learning that he had a daughter who wasn’t perfect. He said it would hurt him professionally.

‘So he offered me a better settlement to get out, and I accepted it because that was best for Nikki anyway. I came back here and used the money to buy the house. It’s a living.’

‘Not much of one if you have to work in the evenings too. When do you sleep?’

‘Ah, but look on the bright side. I never have to pay for babysitting. There’s always someone at home with Nikki, and she likes them all.’

‘So none of them reacted hurtfully to her face?’

‘No, but I warned them all before they saw her. I never leave it to chance, if I can help it, and of course she guesses that. It’s people like you she values, the ones who had no warning.’

‘I just hope I don’t let her down.’

Laura frowned. ‘I don’t think that’s possible,’ she said thoughtfully. ‘It’s the spell, you see. It’s cast over you too, and whatever you do, she’ll see it in the best way, in the light of that spell.’

‘You talk as though you believe in magic,’ he said curiously.