Ruth pulls out her hair, William pulls a neat trick and Jolene pulls some pints.

Radio Times: Sid really knows Jolene’s worth.

Characters: Caroline, Joe, Jolene, Ruth, Sid, Usha, William

• While helping Caroline with her gardening, William reveals that he has found three orphan kittens. Greg told him to drown them but he just cannot bring himself to do it. Caroline applies logic and convinces him that he cannot keep them because he does not have the time to feed them. Ah, but he knows a man who does!
• Usha’s efforts to tempt Ruth out for a quiet drink are rebuffed very sharply. Clearly something is wrong for her to snap like that. She has just discovered that her hair is beginning to fall out. Usha tries to console her: these things go deep and it takes a crisis to really find out about oneself. Ruth wishes she could be more generous and let David make a fuss of her. He wants to cook her a special meal; the trouble is she doesn’t want “special”, she just wants things to be ordinary again. All these feelings, Usha points out, really should be poured out to David.
• Sid is looking forward to Caroline’s visit and has been putting together some ideas about picking up the Cat & Fiddle trade. Jolene seems to have been more help than Kathy in this exercise but they agree that it would not go down well if Jolene took part in the meeting with Caroline. A phone call tells them that Betty is ill, so with two coachloads expected this evening Jolene will not be taking a discreet back seat.
• Out in the country air, beside the caravan, puffing on his pipe, Joe could almost convince himself that life ain’t so bad. As William points out to him, there are no restrictions on keeping animals here – like the three kittens he just happens to have in his pocket. A little persuasion is needed: if Joe looks after the orphans, William will not tell the world how daft they have been to believe Joe’s spile troshing invention. So Joe has something to occupy his time, the kittens know where their next meal is coming from and William is spared a very unpalatable task; nice one William.
• The Bull is heaving. Usha has been trying to attract Jolene’s attention to order drinks but is obviously of the wrong sex. Caroline is suitably impressed and apparently unaware that arranging her meeting with Sid on such a busy night was no coincidence. She is less impressed to see Jolene behind the bar as Kathy has a lot of friends in the village but Sid explains that Jolene had to step into the breach when Betty called in sick. It is obviously not the best time to discuss it but Sid will have to sort out how to prevent his personal life from affecting the business; he already seems to have worked out how he is going to do just that.