Henry was late to a friend's birthday dinner in London and took the only empty seat, which was next to Claire, who had been given the wrong date and had been waiting at the table for forty minutes. She had already ordered. He apologised for the whole restaurant.

Six years later he asked her to marry him on the terrace of a rented house above Deià, badly, halfway through breakfast, because he could not wait until the walk he had planned. She said yes before he finished the sentence. We kept the house for this weekend.