‘Good Lord, Sadie,’ he said. I wanted to hurl myself against him, and hug and be hugged in return, but he held me at arm’s length so he could look at me. ‘How tall and brown you are. I’m not sure I’d have recognised my little girl.’

I bit my lip. This was a compliment, but it emphasised the extra distance that the summer had put between us. ‘I’m still the same,’ I mumbled. Ted looked thinner. ‘How are you? Where have you been?’ I blurted out.

‘Around and about,’ he said, in the voice that told me not to ask any more questions. I followed him through into the kitchen and put the kettle on. I opened the fridge to look for milk and found that it was empty.

So there was an entirely new perspective to the picture, like one of those images that can be either a candlestick or two facing profiles, depending on how you look at it. I had been banished or I had enjoyed the best summer of my life. Ted had abandoned me or he had tried to save me from the humiliation of knowing my father was in prison.

I had walked a long way down the glittering beach. I turned and faced out over the waves. Ted felt very close at hand now. I couldn’t see him because his shape, the genie that had escaped from the bottle, was changing all the time. I couldn’t fix him, or the past, or even myself without finishing what I had begun.

But my face was wet with tears at last and I could hardly see the way as I walked on, leaving my solo footprints in the sand.

TEN

Most of Turnmill Street looked tranquil and prosperous in the afternoon sunshine. Pools of shade from the tidy trees spilled over the parked cars and clipped hedges, and there were tasteful white or silvery themed flower displays in tubs and window boxes. A trio of small children in private-school uniforms was being shepherded out of a people carrier by a young woman who was probably their nanny.

The flakes of paint and ancient plaster from the façade of Audrey’s house drifted across the cracked path and fell on the deposits of litter in the garden. I banged on the door and waited, then stooped and tried to peer through the letter box. When I straightened up to knock again the door did its trick of swinging open without warning and Audrey confronted me.

‘Yes?’

‘I was just passing,’ I said with approximate truth.

‘Yes?’

‘And so I thought I’d call, on the off-chance that you might be in.’

Her full lips crimped as if to acknowledge a glimmer of humour in this but the amusement was private, not to be shared with me.

‘May I come in?’ I persisted.

‘All right.’