I have my own room, in the attic. It is sparsely furnished, yet comfortable. There are a mirror and a sink, but otherwise the room is clean and bare. There is no carpet, but a wooden floor, which, like my bed, the wardrobe and the bedside table, is of varnished deal. A Turkish rug with a peacock in the centre hangs on one of the walls. The room is cosy and warm. No doubt the colour scheme –the walls are painted a brilliant pillar-box red, the rug is mostly crimson, and my eiderdown cover is a deep indigo– contributes to this impression. The weather here has been mild lately although at this very minute it’s drizzling. But it’s not cold. If it is, there’s a portable heater I can use, but I haven’t got it on at the moment. For all that, I didn’t sleep too well last night; I always have trouble without you.

The Hassocks have two pets: a tabby cat called Magnifi, and a chartreuse parakeet called Paraclete. The former is, in its behaviour, not so dissimilar from a student, keeping the most irregular hours, often coming back very late in the evening, sometimes not until the following morning, and sleeping seemingly whenever and wherever it chooses, although, as far as the Hassocks are aware, it has yet to develop a taste for alcohol. The latter lives in a gilded, bell-shaped cage in the parlour. Every so often it squawks ‘Repent!’, and the shock I felt on hearing this as I was taking a large bite of a slice of Battenberg cake the first night I was here caused my hosts great amusement. ‘Ha-ha! Gets ’em every time!’ said the vicar. ‘It was James’s idea. Much better than “Who’s a pretty boy, then?” or “Pieces of eight!”, don’t you think?’ James beamed proudly as I praised his ingenuity. I should explain that from where I was sitting I could not see the cage. The parrot decided to give us some more examples of its gift for mimicry, declaiming, with unnerving enthusiasm, ‘In the beginning… was… the Bird!’, before spoiling the effect a little by adding: ‘Flippin’ kids!’