Stella was prepared for this meeting. In her coat pocket she had the texts, printed out double-sided on recycled paper. For Mariam, a series of points summarising the established academic theory that the rise of the worship of Allah had historically co-opted and suppressed the pre-existing matriarchal religion of the goddess AlLat. For the nun, edited extracts from various female mystics. Stella had given all the male pronouns new grandeur and meaning by the simple addition of an extra S. Plus bits from the Bible. She wasn’t a Christian but she felt the need to defend this book for its rare moments of female solidarity. It was Stella’s grandmother who had spoken to her of Ruth and Naomi: how, after Naomi’s husband and sons died, her daughter-in-law Ruth stayed with her, and there was famine and they became gleaners. Stella had read out this passage at the last gathering on Cwen, to the surprise of the other women, who were totally allergic to patriarchal texts. And Ruth said, Intreat me not to leave thee ... for whither thou goest, I will go; and where thou lodgest, I will lodge: thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God: Where thou diest, I will die, and there will I be buried.

This is our heritage, Stella had argued, we have to use it.

– And God to Jeremiah! How mystic was that? Before I formed you in the womb, I knew you. She would turn it into a song, before the winter was out.

She’d pasted the words from the Book of Ruth and Book of Jeremiah at the top of the papers she’d put together for Sister Lucija. She would offer to send somebody to pick them up; the meeting was tonight. She would warn them to dress warmly; the island got cold very quickly after dark. The mannequin’s jeans, she saw as she approached, had little rips all the way up the thigh, on either side of the studs.

JUDGE: Did it work? Did they come?

STELLA: [Scowls] No. [Pause] I wanted to invite Zoe instead but Inga said, Not yet. Apparently she wasn’t ready.

Zoe wasn’t ready partly because she was struggling socially at school. Pauline and Kath, her best friends ever since Reception, felt jilted now that she’d joined the Green Club and consequently were being mean to her. Stella and Tara could see what was going on, and they did their best to compensate. Since Ravi seemed interested in educating Zoe in matters to do with the environment, Tara gave them the task of organising logistics for the Green Club camping trip. For a start, Barbara Anderson at the museum café, where Zoe worked weekends, would need to be told. Stella wanted them to think about how to recruit more young men to the cause. Pauline and Kath liked that even less.

‘What about that Ravi, then?’ said Pauline.

‘What about him?’

They stared at her.