He stood aside in silence as she moved past him into the lobby. Camilla looked back at him in desperation, a question in her eyes, but he was smiling as he walked away towards the bar where he and his photographer could put the finishing touches to their story.

In the security of her flat she stripped off her clothes and ran a bath. Several of her stitches had broken, and the cut was bleeding and had already started to swell above her right eyebrow. It would probably have to be stitched again and she would definitely have bruising. She cleaned the red welt with cotton wool and warm water, and covered it with a fresh dressing. When she lay down and tried to sleep, she was transported back to Langani, with the panga hurtling towards her in the lamplight as she wrenched the rings and bangles off her hands. She opened her eyes again but her mind still held the jumble of violent images, and in the back of her brain she could hear the strange, desolate sound her father had made as she closed the door on the tryst with his lover. It was impossible to consider seeing him again, even though she had failed to find help for Langani from Johnson Kiberu. She felt as though her life had been smashed to pieces and swept away.

For all of the next day Camilla stayed in the flat, her forehead throbbing, her head hazy with pain and regret. The telephone jangled several times but she did not answer it. She knew that she should telephone Edward and arrange a date to have her stitches repaired, but a deep lethargy smothered her, making her body heavy and dull so that it was an effort to move. When finally she dressed and made herself something to eat, she sat at the table, unable to face the food she had prepared. The television told her nothing of importance and she paced the room for a time, before pouring a large amount of vodka into a glass full of ice. She felt the power of it in the back of her throat as she swallowed it in two desperate gulps, and she slopped a second measure into the tumbler. When the telephone intruded yet again she picked it up, her head swirling. Sarah’s anxious voice sounded far away and Camilla choked on her response. She stumbled over words that would hide her loneliness and sense of separation. She did not want pity. When she put the receiver back on its cradle she had no clear idea what she had said. The tranquillisers were in the bathroom cabinet and she swallowed one. An hour later it was her mother’s voice on the line and she hung up and went to bed.