Bibi had always taken pretty good care of herself but her chief ally was her genes. Her mother had been the same. Some people can’t help it, they just look older than they are. It isn’t their fault.

Bibi, going to the other extreme, looked a lot younger than her years. She always had. At forty, people refused to believe she could be the mother of a strapping twenty-year-old son. At fifty, in a police line-up (heaven forbid) she could have passed for thirty-five.

At fifty-eight she met James Elliott and was astounded by the strength of her feelings for him.

When, on their third date, he mentioned in passing that he was forty-three, Bibi had been stunned. James’ neatly trimmed beard had fooled her; she had put him at fifty.

And she liked him so much. Really liked him. The prospect of losing him was unbearable.

Panicking, she told James she was forty-six.

The repercussions of her spur-of-the-moment fib had been endless. No longer could Bibi relate the story of the day her father had come home from the war. Memories of her teenage years were hastily rejigged. Her entire past had needed to be unceremoniously hauled forward a decade-anda-bit.

And since owning up to a thirty-seven-year-old son was out of the question – ‘What, you mean you had him when you were nine?’ – Bibi had been forced to lop a few years off his age too.

Patrick hadn’t been thrilled.

‘Is this a joke?’ he had demanded. ‘Ma, you’re mad. It’ll never work.’

But Bibi wasn’t joking. She was desperate.

‘It will, it will. He doesn’t suspect a thing. Anyway, you only have to be twenty-nine. I’ve already told James I had you at seventeen.’

Only the fact that his mother was so obviously happy again for the first time in years persuaded Patrick to go along with the ludicrous charade.

‘It won’t last,’ he had warned her. ‘You’ll be caught out sooner or later.’

Bibi hugged him.

‘Not if we’re clever I won’t.’

And, miraculously, she hadn’t been caught out. Everyone played their part, all Bibi’s friends kept her shameful secret to themselves and Bibi kept her passport and driving licence locked securely out of sight. She and James were a couple, happier together than any other couple she knew. From time to time, referring to the three-year age gap between them, he lovingly called her his older woman. From time to time as well, he asked Bibi to marry him.

If she could have done so without him finding out how old she really was, Bibi would have been up that aisle like a shot. As it was, she insisted she preferred living in sin.

‘For God’s sake, tell him,’ an exasperated Patrick had urged just before Christmas. ‘He’ll understand. After all this time, how can your age matter? It’s you he loves, not your date of birth.’

But Bibi flatly refused to even consider telling James the truth. She couldn’t take that risk. There was too much to lose. Besides, some ages sounded worse than others. James teased her enough about being forty-eight.

And she was sixty.

Could anything, Bibi wondered with a shudder, sound worse than that?

Chapter 6

Once Dulcie had made up her mind about the party she threw herself into organising it with enthusiasm.

She decided to hold it at Brunton Manor. Home was out of the question if the party was to be a surprise — immersed in his work he may be, but even Patrick’s suspicions might be aroused by the sight of a mobile disco being set up in the sitting room and Dulcie sweating away in the kitchen sticking a million sausages on to sticks.

Anyway, sweating away in the kitchen wasn’t Dulcie’s forte. Eating food was more her line of country than preparing it.

Far better to let the Brunton Manor catering team take care of all that.

Better still, she wouldn’t have to clear up disgusting party debris the next day.

‘You’ll come, won’t you?’ said Dulcie when she rang Pru.

Pru hesitated. ‘What does that mean? Who are you inviting?’

‘Loads of people!’

‘I mean just me, or me and Phil?’

They hadn’t spoken since the awkward showdown at Pru’s house. Dulcie chewed her lip.

‘Whichever. Just you, if you’d prefer. Or both of you.’ Ouch, she’d chewed too hard. ‘Um ... do you want to bring Phil?’

‘He’s my husband. Of course I’d like him to be there.’ Pru sounded stilted.

‘Well, that’s fine.’

‘But only if you’re going to be nice to him. I mean it, Dulcie. No snide remarks. No digs. Not from you and not from Liza either. I couldn’t bear it. You both have to promise to behave.’

It was on the tip of Dulcie’s tongue to remark that if anyone should be promising to behave it was Phil. Heroically she kept her opinion to herself.

‘I promise.’ Heck, she felt like a schoolgirl being told off for smoking in the toilets. ‘And Liza will too. We’ll both be .. . angelic. On our very best behaviour,’ she assured Pru. ‘We’ll treat Phil like a king.’

King Rat, thought Dulcie as she put the phone down. Maybe she’d invite Rentokil along to the party. A spot of poison slipped into Phil’s drink might just do the trick.

Dulcie was wrapping up the box containing Patrick’s laser printer on the morning of the party when the phone rang. Armed to the teeth with Sellotape, she had used up at least three miles of foiled paper and six miles of curly ribbon. Cooking might not be her thing but if she said so herself, she wrapped a mean present.

Patrick knew what was inside the box, of course. Not trusting Dulcie to come back with the right one, he had gone to Computerworld and bought the printer himself.

Still, it was what he wanted and it was spectacularly wrapped. As soon as Dulcie had put the finishing touches to the sides she was going to cart it down to the club where he could open it tonight.

The phone was still ringing. Dulcie grabbed the receiver, fantasising briefly that it was one of their friends asking if they could bring Kevin Costner along to the party.

But life was somehow never that thrilling. It was Eddie Hammond, the manager of Brunton Manor. Sounding agitated.

‘Dulcie, bit of a hitch. I’m really sorry about this—’

‘What?’ yelped Dulcie, all of a sudden agitated too. If the club had been burned to the ground, where would she hold the party tonight? More to the point, where was she going to spend the rest of her life?

‘It’s the kitchen staff, darling. Gone down like ninepins. Fingers crossed it’s just a virus but the health inspector’s thrown a wobbler. Until salmonella’s ruled out, he’s shut down the kitchen. So

... ah ... no food, I’m afraid, tonight.’

Uh oh, panic attack. Dulcie went hot and cold all over.

‘No food?’ She wanted to cry. ‘What, nothing at all? Eddie, we can’t have a party without food!’

‘I know, I know,’ he said soothingly. ‘Sweetheart, I can’t tell you how bad I feel about this. But you’ve got a few hours to go ... that’s why I rang as soon as I could. If you organise your own buffet you can bring it down here yourself. I checked with the health inspector and he said that would be fine.’

‘Oh terrific. Hooray for the health inspector,’ howled Dulcie. ‘Maybe he’d like to whip up a couple of dozen quiches in his tea break.’

But it didn’t matter how sympathetic Eddie Hammond was to her plight, there was nothing he could do to help.

So Dulcie did the only thing she could do. She phoned Liza and Pru.

Liza was out. She had driven up to London to meet her editor, Dulcie remembered as soon as she got the answering machine, and wouldn’t be back before seven. Typical.

But Pru was at home, thank God. Pru with the best-stocked kitchen cupboards in Bath.

‘How many guests?’ she asked, cutting through Dulcie’s anguished wailings.

‘About a hundred.’

‘Right, I’ll make a start here. I can rustle up rice salad, pasta salad, stuffed baked potatoes, that kind of thing—’

‘That won’t be enough.’ Dulcie knew she sounded ungrateful. She didn’t mean to, but her heart was in her boots already. Any minute now it was going to start burrowing through the carpet.

‘Of course it won’t. That’s why I’m doing it. Leaving you free to shop. Got a pen and paper?’

said Pm, admirably unfazed by the crisis. But that was because it was all right for Pru, thought Dulcie, it wasn’t her crisis. ‘Now, start making a list. I’ll tell you what to buy.’

God bless M&S, thought Dulcie an hour later as she steered her trolley expertly past an old dear with a basket-on-wheels. This was okay, this was fine, her heart was back in its rightful place and she was actually beginning to enjoy herself.

Buying up Marks & Spencer’s food department was far more fun, too, than simply dropping in to pick up a couple of chicken tikkas and a lemon drizzle cake. Cramming a trolley with baguettes, boxes of hors d’oeuvres, bags of prawns, packets of Parma ham and twenty different kinds of cheeses was an exhilarating experience. No longer panicking, Dulcie meandered happily amongst the fresh fruit and veg, choosing the ripest Charentais melons, the reddest, glossiest strawberries .. .

A male voice in her ear made her jump.

‘Can I come?’

Dulcie spun round. Good grief, it was James.

‘James!’

Three lemons and a bottle of tonic were rolling around in the bottom of his wire basket. Dulcie remembered that he and Bibi had guests for dinner themselves.

James, meanwhile, was studying the contents of her overloaded trolley with interest. Grinning, he said again, ‘Can I come’?’

‘Come where?’ Dulcie prayed she wasn’t blushing.

‘Well, call it spooky intuition if you like, but something tells me you’re having a party.’ His eyes twinkled; he and Dulcie had always got on like a house on fire. ‘Either that or an attack of rampant bulimia.’