‘You want to come over with me? Say hello?’ said Suki, watching her mother with concern. She was frightened Claire might pass out; she looked dazed, shaken.

Claire could only nod. She followed Suki across the room, weaving among the packed tables, dodging hostesses hurrying around with trays of drinks and empty glasses. Spiro looked up. Then Nikos. Finally, Josh. He saw Suki standing there. Suki stepped aside and they were face to face, Josh and Claire.

Josh slowly stood up. Claire was standing right there in front of him.

‘Hey, what’s this?’ joked Spiro. Then he saw the tears staining Claire’s face, her stricken expression, and his smile dropped away. ‘What’s going on? You two know each other?’

‘Yeah,’ said Josh, his eyes never once leaving Claire’s face. ‘Yeah, we do.’

‘Josh,’ said Claire, and then her tears became laughter. ‘Oh Jesus! Josh!’

They moved together then. Claire threw herself into Josh’s arms and he lifted her clean off her feet, spun around with her, kissing her beloved face, crushing her against him.

‘I can’t believe it, I can’t believe it,’ he was saying over and over in a choked voice. ‘Claire. My darling, my Claire.’

Spiro looked at Suki, who was standing there grinning and blinking back tears at the same time. All around them, people were staring, forgetting their conversations, smiling, watching Claire and Josh together. Something big was happening here, something momentous.

Then Josh set Claire back on her feet. He swiped at his eyes. Couldn’t believe it. He was crying.

‘Where the fuck have you been?’ he asked her, cupping her face in his hands. She was shivering with emotion. ‘What did you do, where did you go? No! Don’t worry, it doesn’t matter. You’re here now. You’re here.’

And he kissed her, Claire who had danced through the meadows with him when they were young, Claire who he had lost but finally, miraculously, found again.

88

88

Claire took some days off and she and Josh spent time together, just walking, eating together. He showed her around the grand Waldorf Astoria and took her up to his hotel room. Kissed her. Claire quickly pulled away.

‘Josh . . .’

‘Yeah, honey?’

‘There are things about me you don’t know,’ she said, looking troubled. She nodded her head toward the bedroom. ‘I mean, I’m not sure I can . . .’

Josh’s eyes were intent on her face. ‘You’ve been married, I suppose?’

Claire shook her head.

‘But the girl. The one who looks so like you, I thought that was your daughter.’

‘Suki? She is.’

‘Yet you’re still nervous about sex?’ he asked gently.

He looked at her, trying to read her mind. So she’d had an illegitimate child. He wasn’t worried about that, why should he be? But she looked closed off from him all of a sudden, and that disturbed him.