‘Bravo,’ someone shouted and the cry was taken up across the whole theatre. They stood side by side, flushed and dazed with pleased surprise at the acclaim. Oliver put his arm round Pansy’s shoulders and kissed her cheek, and she leaned against him. They were both laughing now and suddenly the spell of the performance was behind them. They were themselves again.

At last the clapping died away. Helen saw that the only empty seats were the ones left by the London critics who had slipped away to phone in their reviews for the early editions. There had been no stampede for the exits tonight.

Now, with the curtains firmly closed at last, she watched the audience streaming up the aisles and saw that there was a smile on every single face.

Not bad, she thought. Not bad for a piddling student production of the classics, and she smiled at the memory of Tom’s cynicism.

The awkwardness between them all forgotten, Helen longed to find Tom and congratulate him.

‘We must go backstage. Darcy, we must.’

Darcy looked horrified. ‘No. It’ll be all people kissing each other and shrieking. You go – I’ll wait for you.’

Helen was still glowing with the joy of the play, and for the first time, his reticence struck a chord of irritation in her.

‘Don’t you think Oliver will be hurt if you don’t go?’

‘No. Yes.’ He looked so miserable that Helen was sorry at once.

‘Come on,’ she said gently. ‘There’ll be so many people no-one will notice us. We’ll just say “well done” and go away again.’

Reluctantly, Darcy followed her.

The spiral of narrow stairs that linked the dressing rooms was packed with laughing, cheering people. The crowd was thickest in Pansy’s room. When Helen and Darcy squeezed in, they found her perched in a sea of flowers. Pansy blew them a kiss. A glass of champagne was being passed to her, hand to hand over the heads of the crowd. Beside her Oliver twisted the cork off another bottle. He lifted the bottle with a flourish and drank from it, and silver foam ran down his chin and splashed over his shirt. He spluttered and laughed and Pansy reached across to ruffle his hair. Helen thought he looked happier than he had done for weeks.

They were, once again, the perfect couple.

Head down, Darcy wriggled through the throng to Oliver’s side. He touched his brother’s shoulder and, with his quick, shy smile, murmured, ‘well done’. Extravagantly Oliver flung his arm out to embrace Darcy and shouted, ‘Look everyone. Even my mystery brother came.’

Darcy went scarlet but everyone’s attention had shifted to the doorway. A bulky man in an emphatically tailored suit was forcing his way in.

‘Daddy!’ Pansy shouted over the uproar. ‘Weren’t we good?’

Masefield Warren kissed his daughter’s forehead as gently as if she were a piece of rare china.