‘Good idea,’ she said, smiling up at him and putting her hand on his arm. ‘Let’s go shopping.’

Chapter 11

Kenya, August 1965

They lay in the sea, aimless and happy. Sarah closed her eyes against the yellow of a scorching sun and allowed a series of small, rippling waves to caress her, raising pleasurable goose bumps on her skin. It was their last day at the coast and she did not want it to end. She could hear the whisper of the wind in the casuarina trees that fringed the beach, and the soft clatter of the palm fronds surrounding the small cottage they had rented. Tomorrow they would fly to Nairobi where Piet would be waiting. They were going to spend the night at George Broughton-Smith’s flat, and then they would go to Langani. She opened one eye and looked at Camilla’s perfect form, floating a few yards away.

‘Why can’t I have collarbones that stick out, and cheekbones that make shadows and shapes on my face?’ Sarah said. But she did not really care, because her skin was tanned and her hair had been streaked blonde by the sun, and the grey skies of Dublin were thousands of miles away. She had moved through the last two weeks in a current of euphoria.

‘God, you’re such a halfwit, Sarah.’ Camilla turned in the water and swam slowly towards the shore, calling back over her shoulder. ‘You’d better shape up for tomorrow when the great man comes down out of his tree house to collect us. I’m dying to be at Langani. And we’ll see Hannah’s Viking.’

‘She says he’s one of those men who thinks a woman should be gainfully occupied in the kitchen, with a batch of children squealing around her lap. Or mending his socks. Not running farms. I think she only tolerates him.’

Sarah was more than happy to be discussing someone else. It helped to quell the fluttering of anticipation and fear in her stomach. She would see Piet tomorrow, look for what was new in him and relish the things she remembered. He would speak to her in the soft, Afrikaans lilt that she loved, and she would make him tell her all his dreams. No matter what had gone before, it would be wonderful to spend time with him. Hannah knew everything now, so there were no more secrets. On their first night at the coast there had been a tension between them all, as they sat talking after dinner. Finally, Camilla had broached the subject of the weekend in London.

‘I behaved terribly,’ she said to Hannah. ‘What I did to Piet was inexcusable. It was a spur-of-the-moment thing – a knee-jerk reaction. He got in the firing line between myself and my dear mother. I apologised to him. To everyone. And I only hope he’s not still angry with me, though he has every right to be.’