Daddy. He gets to be Daddy. I am nothing. I have no name. Even the one I was born with has been stripped away. My heart is thudding so violently I imagine it would be visible if I looked down at my own breast. I stand, amazed my legs don’t simply fold at my own weight, though my fingers are tight on the arm of the rocking chair. I can hear him coming up the stairs, up and up the stairs, his footfall still in my bones.

‘You get to meet Zac sooner than expected.’ Eliza attempts a smile, but it falters.

He calls, ‘I changed to the early flight.’

Eliza’s distress at Zac’s seemingly unexpected early return has me convinced that she doesn’t know who I am. If she does, she deserves an Academy Award. If she does, then she and Zac have planned this with chilling care, including the charade that he was in Edinburgh.

But I don’t think this is a charade. She found out about Alice’s need for iron late yesterday. I know that was genuine, and by then she’d already said he was away. She isn’t handing me to Zac on a plate. More likely she doesn’t want him to catch her with a friend, or to imagine she has made any. He is doing to her exactly what he did to me all the time. Pretending to go away. Or actually going but returning ahead of schedule for a surprise ambush.

Eliza’s hands are trembling. I nearly clasp them in my own to try to calm her, but she moves before I get the chance.

‘Daddy!’ Alice toddles off towards the door, and Eliza scoops her up. ‘Daddy now!’ Alice cries. She is squirming so furiously I don’t know how Eliza manages to keep hold of her. I can make sense, now, of how Eliza got the red mark on her cheek a couple days ago. ‘Want Daddy!’

The footsteps pause on the first-floor landing. He calls up. ‘I wanted to see the two of you before my afternoon appointment. Let me take a quick shower, first.’

‘Daddy!’ Alice is screaming. She is pounding her fists against Eliza’s shoulders and arms.

‘Be right there, sweet girl,’ he says. There is the sound of a door closing.

Thank God he is still germicidal. He can’t bear to fly without washing the air travel away as soon as he walks in the door, before touching anything or anyone.

‘Don’t worry,’ Eliza says. ‘Daddy just wants to get all clean for us, after the aeroplane. While we’re waiting for Daddy, how about we go and try some of the special new medicine Helen brought you? We can have it with some juice. Shall we try apple?’

‘I’ll slip out, Eliza. Leave you time alone with your family.’