“There’s a mistake here.”

“Really?”

It’s Jonathan on the phone. I have sent over the latest instalment for his Wednesday deadline. He, typically, is calling Friday with his changes.

“I get that it’s Catherine Dickens speaking. Very clever. But she’s eating cake…”

“Yes.”

“But before, what’s her name, Mrs. Ternan, was offering her store-bought biscuits. Remember the bit about biscuits from Fortnum and Mason’s.”

“Yes, I do.”

“And she took sugar in her tea.”

“Yes, no biscuits, two lumps of sugar, all three of Mrs. Ternan’s daughters were present and it was a rainy day.”

“So, she went a second time?”

“I doubt it. We don’t even really know if she went once. This is all speculative.”

“Speculative?”

“Yes, I am writing fiction, after all. So this is a different version, a different piece of speculation about what might have happened if Mrs. Dickens came to call.”

“The readers won’t understand that. If they notice at all, they’ll think it’s a mistake.”

“Maybe they’re smarter than you think.”

I argue the point with Jonathan, who finally agrees to the inconsistencies if he’s allowed to put his own headline on the piece. “Mrs. Dickens, Take Two, or something like that.”

On Saturday, Al is much more appreciative.

“I like the seed cake and the slice of lemon,” he says, looking up from the paper. “Nice touch.”

“Thanks.”

“So we are going to hear from the wife?”

“Yeah, I thought it was about time.”

“Is she going to issue warnings? ‘Let me tell you now, dear, before it’s too late, he snores.’ ”

I laugh. It’s the first time Al has appeared anything but irritated by the serial.

He goes back to his reading and finishes a few minutes later.

“How did you figure out the abstinence thing?”

“Just by charting the gaps between her pregnancies.”

“Clever you. Who would have imagined someone with ten kids practised any form of birth control.”

“Ten pregnancies, and at least two miscarriages, in fifteen years. And then he dumped her for a younger woman.”

The minute I say it I wish I could take it back. I can’t keep beating Al with that stick. But he seems unperturbed.

“If only they had the pill,” he says, folding up the paper.