‘It never occurred to me I’d have kids like that!’ David said and laughed, but then he added more soberly, ‘It took me years to realize that the only thing really wrong with those kids was that I didn’t love them, and by then they were grown men I didn’t particularly like.’

‘Could we have loved them?’ Diana asked.

‘We should have.’

‘I don’t know anything about that kind of love,’ Diana said. ‘For me it isn’t voluntary.’

‘Isn’t it?’ David asked. ‘For me love isn’t just voluntary, it’s wilful.’

‘For children … if you’re the father. But for the mother there’s such a basic bonding, or if there isn’t, it can’t be helped. It becomes a matter of duty.’

‘We didn’t have to love each other, did we?’ David asked.

‘I never felt any choice about it at all,’ Diana said. ‘I could have killed you, but I couldn’t have stopped loving you. You were my “given”.’

‘Didn’t you choose to love Constance?’

‘No,’ Diana answered simply.

‘You make love sound like fate.’

‘I think it is,’ Diana said.

‘But that’s impossibly romantic, D!’

Diana smiled at him and said, ‘You’re the romantic, not I.’

‘Well, I would have said so, too, but I didn’t really feel fated to marry Patricia. I simply wanted to.’

Diana wasn’t tempted to reply, ‘Then you shouldn’t have.’ She didn’t mean anything like that. It could have happened that she’d never had the opportunity to live with Constance. It had happened that she hadn’t seen David, except on their birthday, for years. Diana had taught herself not to suffer about it. She had even held herself aloof from him when he came back, but about loving him or loving Constance she had no choice at all, even when she had tried to think she did.

‘I’m going to need those mushrooms in a minute,’ David said.

Diana gave a startled snort. She was getting as bad as Constance about forgetting what she was doing.

‘If this is any good, I might try it on the kids this weekend,’ David said.

‘A bit exotic for kids’ tastes, I’d think,’ Diana said.

‘I suppose it is. And no one wants a grandfather who’s a show-off.’

Diana finished the mushrooms and left him to find Constance at the jigsaw puzzle. The timer around her neck was ticking.

‘You’re early,’ Constance said, without looking up. ‘I’ve figured out what this thing is really for. It’s to let you know when I’m done. But, if I want you, I can cheat. Look!’

Constance took hold of the timer and turned it abruptly to make it ring its bold ring.

‘It’s as good a use for it as any. You don’t have to wear it, you know.’

‘I like it,’ Constance said. ‘It makes me feel edible.’