When I looked back, the woman was falling. Her hands out before her to meet the ground, she crumpled like a wounded soldier until she was finally on her hands and knees, where she froze for a moment, head bowed. A car behind her sounded its horn irritably.

‘Excuse me,’ I said, pushing past a boy on a mountain bike gawping in the doorway. I hurried across the short distance to where she crouched, attempting now to pull herself up, doubled in half as if in pain.

‘Are you all right?’ I bent beside her. Her eyes seemed blind as she looked up at me.

A black Range Rover pulled up behind the Porsche, bumping up onto the grass, gleaming with rain and polish, braking just in time.

‘I …’ She wiped her face on her arm, smudging the streaming eye make-up further. She seemed slightly delirious.

‘Can you stand?’ I said, offering her my hand, trying quickly to assess what was wrong. ‘Are you ill?’

I was half aware of the Range Rover’s door opening, a tall fair man in a black windcheater jumping down now from the driver’s seat.

‘I – I’m not sure,’ she mumbled. Her hand was ice cold. ‘I don’t feel – I’m not—’

‘Maya,’ the man behind me said.

I turned.

‘Thank you,’ he said to me, but he was looking at her. He spoke with a faint Celtic burr that I couldn’t place. ‘I’ll take over now.’

Our eyes met briefly as I stood too fast, staggering very slightly. He put out a hand to me but I’d regained my balance so he turned back to the girl now, sliding his hand into hers, gently releasing mine. I stepped back. He had her now; supporting her, holding her upright. I thought I could smell lemon sherbet.

‘If you’re all right then …’ I backed away, ‘I’ll just—’

‘We’re fine, really. Thanks a lot.’ The fair man nodded at me. Under the artificial light, his eyes were frighteningly blue, his tousled hair sun-bleached like a surfer’s. ‘Ash is in the car, Maya. He’s been really worried. Let’s get you back home, OK?’ His tone was soothing, like he was coaxing a nervous animal into a cage.

Through the open car door I saw the shadowed passenger lean forward and pull the cigarette lighter from the dashboard. I hesitated for a second, and then I ran back to the kiosk before I got any more wet.

The unnerved cashier was still muttering to her colleague about what to do and the burly man in his smelly red anorak was still loudly demanding someone call the police when another collective groan went up. I turned to see the girl collapse again, and now another man was by her side, dark-skinned like her, dressed in an expensive navy coat. The fair man stepped back.