He hands me the flowers. The smell of them fills the hall, dwarfs me and hides me from his sight. I suddenly want to giggle.
‘Heavens, you disappeared.’ He takes them back, laughing, and we fill the sink. Suddenly I feel better.
‘I’m not sure if I have enough vases…’ I regale him with the saga of my awful day. I get wine out of the fridge and pour two huge glasses.
‘Sorry about your hellish day.’
He raises his drink to me and we clink glasses and I am so pleased this man is standing in my kitchen that I reach up and kiss him on the side of his mouth. ‘Thank you so much for my ginormous, wonderful bunch of flowers.’
‘I didn’t know what you like so I got a mixture of everything in the shop.’
‘So I see.’ We stare at each other, delighted. ‘Look, I’ve got to go back down to the basement to tidy up. I’ll be five minutes.’
‘May I come down and see where you work?’
He follows me down the stairs and as I tidy and lock up he mooches around in an interested fashion looking at the noticeboard and at designs pinned on plastic models, and the table where I’ve been cutting out.
‘We’re a bit cramped, as you can see. We’re going to have to look for bigger premises eventually, but it’s hard in London. We need to be fairly central for people to get to us.’
‘Fairly central means expensive.’
‘Exactly.’
‘Do you always work this late?’
I laugh. ‘This is early, Tom! Danielle and I are selfemployed.’
We go back upstairs and an exhausted-looking Danielle is in the kitchen pouring herself a glass of wine.
‘I can hear a cork go three storeys up. Hello, Tom.’ She holds up her glass to him. ‘Jenny, you are not changed. Go at once…’
‘Look,’ Tom says, turning to me. ‘You’ve both obviously had a pig of a day, why don’t I order a takeaway for three and you and I can go out for a meal tomorrow, or another night, when you aren’t exhausted?’
Relief floods through me. I have to get up early in the morning. ’Are you sure?’
‘I refuse to play strawberry,’ Danielle says primly.
Tom and I scream with laughter.
Danielle smiles. ‘What? What did I say?’
‘Gooseberry, not strawberry, Elle. Don’t be silly. Where are all our takeaway menus…?’
‘Aha. Girls after my own heart.’
We fish them out and I fly upstairs to have a quick shower. Tom and Danielle get on famously.
Tom had to do a bookkeeping course for the army and he glances over our books for us. ‘Why don’t they teach students the business side of things at art school?’
‘I think some art schools do, but not at Central St Martin’s,’ Danielle says.
‘You really need someone to do this professionally for you.’
‘We’ve got an accountant, but we still have to get the books in order for him and it’s so time-consuming,’ I tell him. ‘But you’re right, we do need someone.’
Danielle and I smile at each other. ‘Actually, we both know the ideal person. We need someone administrative who can also oversee the girls in the workroom, leaving us both free to design. Someone who knows the fashion business inside out.’
‘So, have you asked her?’
‘It’s tricky. She works for a designer we know very well. We’d have to approach her carefully.’
‘Headhunt, entice, persuade, inveigle, you mean?’
‘That is it.’ Danielle laughs. ‘Jenny is nicer than me. She worries. I think we should take Florence out to lunch, Jenny, and just ask her. I do not think she is happy with Sam Jackson.’
‘He certainly takes her for granted. She’s an absolute treasure.’
‘We would appreciate her.’
‘Of course we would. I’ve heard he is appallingly mean with his staff, too.’
Tom pours more wine. ‘That’s the way. Talk yourselves into it. Concentrate on “Operation Headhunt”.’
When Danielle has gone up to bed Tom says, ‘I’m going to go and let you get some sleep.’ But he doesn’t leave for another half-hour. We kiss until my mouth is sore.
The following night we make love on the hard polished floor of his flat because we never make it to the bedroom. I see Tom every day of his ten-day leave and when he goes again I cannot even remember what I had done or where I had gone before I met him.
The creek lay still and deserted in early evening. The tide was in and the last streak of gold-grey sun slanted through a crack in the darkening sky and lit up the water. The boats were turning in a brisk breeze. The world looked like an old black-and-white film.
Terns swooped like dancers in a ballet or an expert aerobatic team and waders cried out over the water. I sat in the hired Volkswagen camper watching the light go. I loved creeks and inlets. The mudflats were not ugly when the tide was out, but beautiful, full of the patterns of birds’ feet and the differing cries of waders. The sound of their cries echoed something primitive inside me.
I pulled the hood of my thick Barbour round me, making sure it hid my face and hair, and stepped down on to soft wet ground. My walking boots sank and I lifted the long coat so that it didn’t trail in the mud. I started to walk along the path.
The creek was deserted. People in the cottages had already drawn their curtains and were busy eating or cooking supper. I knew I must not walk too far because the dark would come quickly and engulf me.
I walked fast past godmother Sarah’s house where Adam and Ruth were staying. The curtains were not drawn and music came from a lighted window. My heart gave a lurch at the thought of them together inside the house. I was on the outside.
I knew that I could walk up the path to the front door and knock. I knew I could be on the inside of that house if I wanted to be, but I couldn’t do it. How could I say anything to Adam with Ruth there? I would have no chance to explain the truth to him: that he was Tom’s son and mine too.
The path was muddy and the hedges high and bare still. Small birds scuttled and swooped past my head, gathering and screeching territorially as dusk descended. I reached the lake on the left of the creek where the birds overwintered. It was ruffled and pitted by wind and current, as if a giant had blown on the surface of the water.
I watched a heron fly over my head and land in the shallow water beyond. It gathered its wings fussily round it and became as still as a stone, long neck and head craned away from me as if praying to some unseen god.
Two swans sailed majestically towards me on the tide, like an omen; feet operating like miniature paddle boats as they hoped for bread. I had so many memories of walking here with Dad on shopping trips to Truro or coming here with Ruth at weekends to her godmother. This place had always been eerily magical.
On my right the hedges disappeared and I walked within sight of the creek again. A lone canoeist appeared out of nowhere, negotiating the narrow channel of water left by the tide with speed and skill. The light was almost gone and it was time to go back. The tide was on the turn and the waders strutted in the shallows making complicated footprints I could not see but only hear in little plops on the chocolate mud.
I had a bizarre feeling that I was watching myself noticing