At Embakasi Airport she realised she did not have much money left. There were taxis outside the terminal, but she decided to take a bus. The driver and passengers stared at her with open curiosity. White memsahibs did not travel on buses, and certainly not alone. She spoke in Swahili as she paid her fare and enjoyed the broad smiles of approval that were her reward. A small toto came to sit beside her, looking up into her face with glowing eyes. He reached out tentatively and touched her, and she took his small hand in hers. Then she adjusted her sunglasses against the glare and stared out the window. The bus swayed and jolted with its cargo of tightly packed humanity. More passengers clung to the windows and doors as the driver stopped to pick up additional fares on the way in to the city.

At the Norfolk Hotel, she went to the reception desk and asked to make a reverse charge call. Standing in the small, panelled phone booth, on the edge of exhaustion, she heard the insistent burr of the phone at Langani. A foreign voice answered, and despair took two steps closer.

‘Lars Olsen? Is that you, Lars? I want to speak to Piet. Is he there? What did you say?’ Her voice was edgy with impatience and weariness. ‘It’s Hannah, his sister. Can you get him please, it’s urgent.’

The seconds seemed to crawl by. Then the familiar voice.

‘Han? Where are you? Ma has been going frantic with worry. Where are you, for Chrissake?’

Hannah stood clutching the telephone. The enormity of what she had done struck her fully for the first time, and her courage disintegrated

‘Piet? I’m in the Norfolk.’ She began to sob. ‘Can you come and get me, Piet? I just want to come home.’

Chapter 8

London, May 1965

Camilla had walked away from her second audition sure that in the autumn she would be at drama school. In the evening she had gone out with Ricky Lane to celebrate, and she could barely remember their return to her flat. They had collapsed with laughter on the landing as she stabbed the key repeatedly towards the lock. Then she had firmly closed the door on his entreaties and fallen on to her bed fully dressed, to sleep for ten hours. Three days later she returned from a long day’s fashion shoot to find the letter. She read it twice, a wave of despair crashing over her as she sat alone on the sofa. Tears of humiliation slid down her face and she poured herself a shot of neat vodka with ice, tormented by the rejection and by her own arrogance. She had been so sure of herself, and now she was paying the price of her conceit.