‘Do you know what I would like us to do, tonight?’

‘Anything in the world.’

‘I want us to go out, to somewhere that Oliver especially liked. I want us to go with Pansy and Chloe, and I want us to drink a lot of his favourite wine, and eat great platefuls of all the things he liked. I want us to talk about him as if he hasn’t just … gone away. I want to say goodbye to him like that. I didn’t feel that this afternoon, all that sorrow and black ceremonial, was anything to do with Oliver.’

Tom bent and kissed her, and there was a kind of fulfilment in his face that had never shown there before.

‘Yes,’ he said gently. ‘That’s just what we’ll do. Oliver would appreciate that.’

SUMMER

FIFTEEN

They went to the old pub in the Cotswold village where Oliver had once taken Helen to lunch. She looked up as they went in at the creaking sign with its painted mulberry tree, remembering.

The discreet dining room was full, but somehow Tom had secured a table. Chloe looked doubtfully around at the heavy oak furniture, the dark panelling and the middle-aged diners.

‘And this is Oliver’s favourite restaurant?’

Tom smiled at her through the candlelight. ‘One of them. Look at the wine list.’

They bent their heads over it together, discovering a common language.

‘Mmm. Oh yes, I see. Clever Oliver.’

Tom was decisive. ‘There’s no choice, really. We must have Krug, Oliver’s champagne. And then the burgundy. Gevrey-Chambertin.’

Clos St Jacques, Helen remembered. ‘Not quite the very greatest, but as good as one can find almost anywhere.’ His voice sounded as clearly as if he was sitting beside her. She leaned back in her chair and looked at her friends. Chloe in a pink ruffled shirt that showed the top of her breasts, her magnificent tawny-red hair pinned back from her face with a jet comb. Flamboyant long jet earrings dangled in her ears. Pansy sat beside her in one of her understated, expensive silk T-shirts. The vivid cornflower blue came nowhere near eclipsing her eyes. And next to her, Tom. Helen didn’t need to look at him. He felt as close to her as if he was part of her own flesh. His hand brushed hers as he filled her glass, and Pansy and Chloe saw their involuntary smiles. The happiness radiating from them would have made explanations seem pedantic.

Chloe and Pansy had seized the chance to say their own kinds of farewell. For all of them, the funeral had been so much empty ritual. Now, gathered around the table with the champagne that had fuelled so many of Oliver’s nights prickling in their mouths, they felt his loss more sharply. Yet, for all the sadness of the evening, there was no unhappiness. They were drawn together, closer than friends, into a kind of family.