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surprised how well she gets on with our customers.’
    â€˜Griffith Tripp,’ I said politely. ‘Harvey Sanditon. I’ll take that straight up to my work room, Mr Sanditon, as I said.’ I held out my hands for the box.
    He didn’t let go. ‘May I see it?’
    Weird. But then, that was what I’d said to Mrs Walker.
    â€˜If you want.’ It made no difference to me either way. There was never any need to apologize for its being untidy, for instance, because I always left it as immaculate as I could, so I could walk in at any time and start on the work in progress. Everything else was stacked neatly on shelves. I led the way upstairs, the vase in its box still in his hands.
    â€˜In here.’ All the lights focused on the table came on at once.
    â€˜Good lord! It looks like an operating theatre.’
    â€˜Yes, a fine arts version of
Casualty
!’ I grinned at him, liking him more because we’d had the same idea. ‘Best put the patient on the operating table then.’
    He unwrapped the vase as carefully as he’d packed it and placed it in the middle. He gave a rueful smile. ‘It’s lovely now, even with only one handle.’
    I nodded happily. Soon it would be utterly beautiful.
    â€˜I’ve never before had a guest who fell asleep at our table, my love,’ Griff said, as we waved Harvey Sanditon on his way. ‘Remarkable.’
    I thought of his half hour doze. ‘Not really. Apparently he drove down overnight.’
    â€˜And presumably intended to make the return journey immediately. What a good job we offered him coffee.’
    â€˜And a good job we could offer him those cup cakes. What did you think you were doing, buying all those, Griff? You know you’re not supposed to eat sugary things, and those are diabetes on a plate . . .’
    This time, I dreamt I got out of the van and tried to lift the body. But his arm turned into a funny little dolphin and shattered as I dropped it.

SIX
    W ith such an important piece of restoration work on my hands, not to mention all the other precious things I needed to reunite with their owners, I didn’t argue when Griff said he’d go to the next house clearance auction by himself. It was only in Sandwich, so he didn’t have too far to drive.
    Mrs Walker would be in sole charge of the shop, I told her. Even if someone actually asked for me, I mustn’t be disturbed, I insisted.
    â€˜I understand – it’s like exam marking,’ she agreed, nodding. ‘But you won’t work too long, will you, or you’ll lose concentration. A break – not that I should use that word, in the circumstances – every half hour.’
    With a grin at her little joke I nodded. Every five minutes, more like. Just to relax the hands and the neck. Just in case I really could use the original fragments, I put them on my table and arranged them. As far as I could tell there was nothing missing, but there’d be more glue than china, with the risk of visible joins. Griff had been right to say making a new handle from scratch would be easier than trying to patch together the broken one. As I picked the fragments over, however, I found something interesting – evidence of two bad cracks. So perhaps it wasn’t altogether Sanditon’s fault.
    Using the other handle, plus Sanditon’s emailed details of the other vase, I got the template as accurate as I could, every measurement verified with calipers. Then I mixed the first quantity of epoxy resin putty. I’d leave it a couple of hours to harden very slightly – I’d still have an hour before it became too hard to work. Time for a lunch break, then. I popped into the shop to join Mrs Walker for a sandwich and a cup of tea and with a couple of orders from our website for her to attend to: she’d pack the items, and nip down to the post office early enough to ensure they arrived next day.
    And then it was back