“We could try,” said the girl with spots.

“She was just on her way out,” said Mandy.

“Out where?” said Enid.

“How should I know?” She tucked a paper napkin into Enid’s collar.

Enid pulled it off. “You have to get hold of her, you must tell her Ian must come. I have to see him. Tell her I’ve changed my mind.”

“Of course you have,” said Mandy.

“We can try if you like,” said the girl with spots.

“Try,” said Enid. “Try.” That word again. She didn’t care anymore.

“All right, all right.” Mandy raised her hands, her palms towards Enid.

“I can cope for a minute,” said the girl.

They had to do it – Enid was sure to keep an eye on Mandy, sure to watch her scuttle from the dining room and not get caught on someone else. They had to do it, because Ian was the only one who knew.

Finetta, 1964

21

Finetta, 1964

As she shut the front door, the phone in her hall rang again. She paused for a moment, one hand still on the handle, her keys in the other. It would be her bloody mother again. She wasn’t going back inside for that. Whatever, it was could wait. Under a warm coat the colour of oatmeal, and chequered with thin red lines, she wore a lemon-yellow winter dress that narrowed at her slim waist. Her hair was coiffed in waves, suspended above her shoulders. She looked at her watch. Perfect. Just under an hour to get there. He’d be early and she wouldn’t have to wait.

She shivered as she climbed into her car – a little white Sprite, convertible and natty, but uncomfortable and terrible in winter; her brother had bought it for her. The windscreen was completely fogged up, and she had nothing to scrape it with. Ian would have had a little tool kit in the boot of his car for just such an occasion. He had a tool kit for everything. She put the quilt, wrapped in tissue paper, on the passenger seat, turned on the engine and waited, with her hands huddled in her lap.

Her bloody, bloody mother. Now she’d have to tell him that she’d told them and they’d told her. She’d only wanted to make her suffer a bit. She hadn’t wanted to scare her so much that she’d cancel him completely. It was absurd. Twenty-five years and now she’d cancelled him, damn it. Finetta blew into her hands and rubbed them together. A tiny patch of clear glass began to grow at the bottom of the windscreen.