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Albert Dormer, who's in his 80s, came to live in Tomich 15 years ago when he tired of London. He found the cottage by chance on a house-hunting trip north with his ex-wife, who encouraged him to buy. He says she probably thought it was fine to live 500 miles apart. It could have been further. They'd looked at a house on the Pentland Firth.

His dog Pickles, a bouncy ginger poodle, jumps on my lap when I sit down on the settee, followed by a Siamese cat who curls herself alongside. Like commas. Both accept stroking.

For years, Albert, a tournament player, was bridge correspondent for The Times and he's written several books on the game. Through bridge, he met Jaime Ortiz-Patino, wealthy grandson of a tin-mining magnate in Bolivia, bridge player and owner of the Valderrama golf course in Spain, and together they travelled on behalf of the World Bridge Federation. Patino had a mission to stamp out cheating in the international game. (Albert says the Italians were the worst.)

He no longer plays. Instead he takes Pickles for long walks in the morning, reads the newspapers, watches a little television and feeds the geese in his garden.