hand reached out to the pretty, orange-skirted lady who covered the telephone. Her fingers caressed the layers of net skirt, searching for comfort.
‘I’ll put the tea on,’ she whispered.
It was an evening like any of the others, except Julia’s room upstairs was empty. There was not even the expectation of her key in the lock. Vernon listened to the play on the Home Service and Betty sat in the armchair opposite him with her knitting coiled in her lap.
At ten o’clock exactly she asked him, ‘Shall I make the cocoa?’
He nodded, not even looking at her over his reading glasses. She was heating the milk, in the special pan she always used, when he came in behind her. His presence seemed incongruous in the tidy kitchen. Betty looked down into the still, white circle of milk.
‘I told her,’ she said roughly. ‘I told her about the adoption.’
He almost bumped against her, but then he stepped back again.
‘I wish you hadn’t. She’s too young yet.’
‘Vernon, she’s grown up. She’s grown up, in that place.’
‘What did she say? How did she take it?’
The milk rose swiftly, and Betty lifted it off the heat.
‘I think she laughed. She said … she said it set her free.’
She couldn’t understand that. Perhaps Vernon would understand it. But all he said, after a long pause, and so quietly that she could hardly hear him, was ‘Perhaps it’s for the best. In the end.’
Betty carried the cups back into the living room and they drank their cocoa in silence. When her cup was empty she said, ‘I’ll go on up.’
Vernon usually followed her, after locking the doors and winding the clock on the mantelpiece. But tonight he sat for a long time in his armchair in the quiet house, staring ahead of him at the lavender and yellow flowers that ran in garlands down the wallpaper.
Betty lay under the eiderdown upstairs with the tears wet and stinging on her cheeks.
It was Jessie who told Mattie what had happened. Julia listened with her head bent, picking at the fringe of the shawl. At the end she broke in, saying fiercely, ‘I’m sorry about what my … about what she said to you and Felix. That’s the way she is. Anyone who doesn’t live like she does is condemned. She did it to Mattie …’
Jessie said gently, ‘There’s no need to be sorry, my duck. And she is your mother. She raised you all those years, whoever had the birth of you.’
Mattie didn’t say much. She was shocked, but a part of her wasn’t even surprised. She put her arms round Julia’s shoulders and hugged her, and then she grinned lopsidedly at Jessie and Felix.
‘Here we are, the two of us. What do you think?’
‘I don’t think anything,’ Jessie declared. ‘I know you belong here, that’s all. You can stay as long as you feel like it. Felix?’
He had gone back to his place by the window, looking down on the square. ‘Of course they can stay,’ he answered.
They had given Julia a glass of vodka and orange and she drank it in a gulp, and then looked round at the three of them.
‘What shall we do?’ she demanded.
‘I’ve just told you,’ Jessie said. ‘Stay here with us.’
Julia’s face softened. ‘Thank you for that. But I meant now, tonight.’ There was a pressure on her chest, tightening, like something threatening to burst out of her. And she felt a weird, wild gaiety. When the others stared at her she laughed, a little too loudly.
‘I want to go out somewhere. Have some fun.’
Jessie hesitated, and then she nodded. She reached down beside her chair for her huge, cracked leather handbag and then peered inside it. From one of the powdery recesses she produced a five-pound note and waved it at Felix.
‘She’s right. No point moping here. Take them both out and buy them dinner. Go on with you.’
Felix took charge. ‘Get dressed, both of you. Something decent. We’ll go to Leoni’s.’
‘Good boy,’ Jessie said approvingly.
When they were ready, they tried to persuade Jessie to come with them.
‘We need you,’ Mattie said, ‘if we’re going to have a posh dinner. Julia and me won’t know which knife to use.’
‘Felix will tell you. He’s good at all that.’
Jessie seemed more firmly lodged in her chair than ever. She was afraid of the long flight of stairs outside her door, and the streets beyond them, but she tried not to let them see it.
‘I’d rather stay here in peace, you know. Fill me up, Mat, will you?’
‘But you belong with us.’ Julia knelt down in front of her, and Jessie saw her feverishly bright eyes.
‘I know I do, duck. And here I am. Now go and have your dinner, and don’t make too much bloody noise when you come back.’
On the way to Dean Street, passing through streets that had become familiar, even homely, Julia felt herself spinning, as if her feet might lose contact with the paving stones. The pressure inside her intensified until she had to run, her arms and legs pumping up and down. Mattie and Felix were breathless behind her, and their feet thudded faster and faster, like drumbeats.
Felix reached out and grabbed her wrist and she swung outwards, her full skirt ballooning up around her legs.
‘What are you running away from?’ he demanded.
‘I’m not running away. Towards something.’
‘What?’
‘Oh, Felix. I don’t know. Freedom.’
‘I’ll drink to that,’ Mattie shouted, catching Julia’s mood.
‘What will you do with it, all this freedom?’
Julia had a momentary sense of space. Dark, windy emptiness, dropping away all around her. She was perched on a tiny foothold, all alone. She reached out and put her arms around Mattie and they swayed together, laughing at Felix.
‘Gobble it all up,’ Julia said triumphantly.
At first Leoni’s seemed forbidding, with its long, white-starched tablecloths and faded decor. It was full of people, all seemingly much older and richer than themselves. But when a table was found for them in the centre of the room, the other diners looked up as they sailed past in the wake of the head waiter. The three of them held their heads up. They knew, somehow, that tonight they were worth looking at. A spark had ignited them.
‘I’ll order for you,’ Felix said. He studied the big white menu, and spoke rapid French to the waiter.
