‘In her chest. The blade punctured her lung. She lost so much blood. She … they … she might not live. Sadie, I …’ He was crying. The hoarse sound of his voice came from trying to suppress his sobs.

I had meant, where was she? Where had Mel been, to put herself in the way of a flashing knife blade?

‘How?’

‘She … went to buy. Went to … to an off-licence. Champagne, for …’

I knew what for. She had been going to tell Jasper that she would marry him. ‘When?’

‘Ten. This evening. Yesterday, now. I’m sorry, I’m not …’

‘Jasper, I’m coming.’

‘It was a robbery, you know? Nothing to do with Mel at all, she was just … just standing there. They ran in, tried to grab money. Booze off the shelves. It went wrong. They, the police, told me. One of them had a knife, a very sharp knife with a long thin blade. They think he might be a butcher.’

A real butcher. A slaughter man.

I had a vision of Mel lying on the off-licence floor with her hair fanned about her head and bright blood spilling. Feet milling around her body and her lipstick another slash of red in her death-white face.

‘I’m coming.’

As I drove to the hospital, oily raindrops spattered the car’s windscreen. I remembered driving up the motorway to Ted’s deathbed and how I had prayed and bargained for him not to go before I could reach him. I didn’t try to pray this time. I just drove through the dead-of-night streets that still managed to be thoughtlessly busy. Yellow and red lights reflected queasily off the tarmac, now slick with rain.

Jasper was sitting in a grey-walled side room that smelled of anguish. He stood up as soon as he saw me and we held tight to each other. He seemed boneless in my arms, an inert weight with all his sunny certainty drained away.

‘Come on,’ I whispered at last. ‘Sit down again and tell me as much as you know.’

I had to lead him to the row of chairs. They were bolted together in a straight line against the wall.

They were operating on Mel. The long thin blade had missed her heart, but her left lung had been punctured and then collapsed. She had lost a huge amount of blood. Jasper had called her mother just after he spoke to me. Lois Archer was on her way.

‘Did the police get them?’ I asked.

‘Get who?’ Jasper was dazed. His eyes followed the minute hand of the clock on the wall and I knew he couldn’t properly concentrate on anything but Mel on the operating table and how long it might be before we could hear any news.

‘The people who did it to her.’

‘Not yet.’