"I suppose that to have been better prepared, you'd have needed to know it was going to happen." Jacob muses, "And by the sounds of it, no one did."

Just like a lot of diseases, people can't know when they will hit. Some things are ticking bombs: a thousand people using the same well and without proper sanitation? A butcher's shop without refrigeration. But you can't predict everything.

"There's a lady here, Persephone. She could tell you. She's good with all sorts of bakery things. Used to make biscuits and cakes a lot, back when we both worked for the same bloke." She probably still does, but not on that sort of scale any more.