A pact is made, unconsciously. Vinu watches Silas turn away from the kitchen window, remembers the suggestiveness with which he leaned towards her at the party. She had been flattered, but is repulsed now by the memory of his breath, hot, whisky-laden, slightly sour, like her father's. No, she does not wish Johan dead; punished, yes, but not dead. True justice would be to deprive someone of life without having to kill them. Perhaps the guilty should be put in limbo, made to live in some twilight zone, conscious of their sins for ever? Just the kind of punishment those daughter-fucking fathers deserve.

She wishes now that Michael would ask her to have sex with him, that they could lie together, their bodies wet with raw, youthful sweat. She gulps the last of her tea, the way desperate adults down the remnants of a strong and bitter drink, aware that all Michael will offer tonight is a puritan abstinence. He is beyond us now, she thinks, beyond all women. Even his mother. She shudders.

‘Someone's walking across my grave,’ she says.

‘It's up your spine they walk, that's the cliché.’

‘God, you are perverse!’

Part Three

Part Three

Retribution

Thou liv'st; report me and my cause aright To the unsatisfied.

William Shakespeare, Hamlet

21

KATE HAD ARRANGED to meet Julian and Silas over lunch, to discuss the plans for Silas's fiftieth birthday party. She had recruited Julian into the cause of organizing a ‘truly wonderful celebration’ . Julian, she felt, had to find ‘new meaning in his life’ now that his marriage was over. Val had left him, suddenly, without even the courtesy of a letter or an e-mail message. She had never been one for disembodied self-justifications. She left it to her lawyer to inform Julian about her intention to sue for divorce, and the conditions under which he would be able to see his son. ‘It's all for the best,’ the lawyer had said, mimicking Val's unctuous tones.

Now Julian was spending aimless hours at the office, trying to formulate a ‘comprehensive HIV policy’ that would soon be redundant, given that the President was about to retire and his designated successor had strong views on how this ‘scourge ought to be tackled’ .

Julian had chosen a restaurant called ‘Crucible’ , because it was chic and decadent, he said. It was one of those new upmarket establishments that promised both ‘style’ and ‘the feel of Africa’ , as if the two concepts were usually contradictory. Nouvelle cuisine in the bush. An hour's drive from Pretoria, Crucible sat like a heavily made-up but lovable old aunt, Julian said, on a ridge overlooking the place where (it was reputed) Man had been born.

‘You'll love it!’