I push through the crowd to the girl and she is not moving, though her eyes are open and she is still alive, I think, thank God. One leg is tucked neatly behind her again, the other out at a horrible angle that I cannot bear to look at, and two of those stocky men are pushing towards us. Holly’s mother offers a pink pashmina to place below her head.

‘Don’t move her!’ another voice says.

I look at that leg and I grab Effie, who is round-mouthed with horror, and shove her into the nearest arms, which are Jen’s, hissing. ‘Take her away, get her away, please. And Alicia and Holly.’ Jen nods dumbly, the colour draining from her face, and grasps Alicia’s hand. Star is so drunk she bursts into tears and begins to wail.

‘Mummy,’ Effie whispers over Jen’s shoulder, ‘the lady’s not flying more now, is she, Mummy?’

I feel a hot needling in my eyes, and I crouch down by the spangled girl who is breathing shallow rapid breaths, and I say, ‘Try not to move, OK?’ and I try really hard to smile reassuringly.

‘The ambulance is coming,’ an authoritative voice says, I don’t know whose. I think it’s one of those men, he’s on a phone, and I take the girl’s hand and it’s so cold, and as I look up I see the other two thugs escort my husband through the arch, towards the front door. And by the door I think I see Ash Kattan turning away, and the beautiful blond boy. They look like brothers, I think vacantly, though the blond boy looks horrified, truly sickened – and then a voice cuts through my thoughts.

‘It was like she threw herself off,’ the voice says, ‘I’m sure she did.’

‘It looked like she did,’ someone else agrees, breathy with shock. ‘It was like she was – I don’t know. Trying to fly.’

I turn back to the silver-spangled girl and I wonder why her sequins are turning darker, and then I realise with a kind of dull horror it must be blood. I see her eyes flutter, reflecting the thousand tiny lights strung up around the room, and she’s saying something, something I can’t understand. A name, I think. Helen Kelsey’s husband, Frank, is heading towards me now and I remember with relief that he’s a doctor.

Just as I hear the front door bang shut against the spring wind, the candles all guttering in the breeze, the girl’s eyes close; they flutter and they close. The reflections are extinguished; her eyes are shut.

Chapter Twenty