‘Alice?’ Robert presses evenly. ‘Can you get in the car, please?’

‘You know, I was just thinking . . .’ I speak in a bright normal sort of voice, as though we were negotiating arrangements for a picnic in the park, ‘why don’t you all go now and I’ll follow you later?’

Robert decides not to hear me.

‘Please get in the car, please, Alice.’

But I go on shaking my head.

‘Get in the car, Mummy,’ Jack says. ‘You’ll only end up arguing with Daddy.’

‘No, really, why don’t you guys go on ahead?’

Robert turns off the ignition and gets out. ‘What are you doing?’

I tell him I can’t go. I promise to come later. ‘I can’t leave all this,’ I say. The children’s faces are pressed to the windows.

‘All what?’

‘Everything. Temerosa.’

‘Temerosa!’ he says incredulously. ‘Alice, this is a war zone! This is a place of hell! What do you mean you can’t go? You can’t stay!’

‘I have to.’

‘Why?’ he asks desperately.

‘Don’t ask me to explain. I can’t explain.’

‘Alice . . .’

And I turn away, too spineless to face the pain in his eyes.

‘Alice . . .’ Robert takes a huge breath. ‘We. Are. A. Family.’

‘I know.’ Of course I know this is my family, but a man I love is out there somewhere and he may be hurt, and he may be dead and I need to find him and hold him, otherwise all the days I have left in my life will stack up one after the other, grey and pointless except to torture me with what ifs.

‘Alice, unless you get in the car right now, this marriage is over and, so help me God, you’ll never see me or the children again.’ White spittle has collected in the corners of his mouth.

‘Don’t be silly, Robert.’

‘Alice, for God’s sake, don’t do this.’ He grabs my arm. ‘Get in the car.’

The children are watching. They know we are fighting. I bathe them in a dazzling smile of normality as I yank my arm free.

‘Then none of us will go,’ Robert changes tack. ‘I simply won’t allow you to stay behind and that’s all there is to it.’

I harden everything left in my heart and turn my back on my children.

‘And what if you have killed someone, what then?’

The remaining spots of red anger fade from Robert’s cheeks.

‘You go round knifing people, even Mexicans, and the police tend to want to talk to you.’

‘Alice . . .’

‘Listen to me. You have a chance to get out now, probably one chance only. I think you should take it.’

‘Alice, I’m begging you—’

‘I’ll come later. I promise.’

‘No,’ he says flatly. ‘You won’t.’

The children stare at me as if I’ve decided to speak in another language.