“Howard, you are too hard on yourself,” Jean protested, tears springing to her eyes.

“She told me she had never really stopped loving Martha, even though she never expected to see her again.”

“That was cruel of her.”

“She didn’t mean it to be. She said she loves me too, and I believe her.”

“But what about Margaret? Gretchen would never do anything to hurt Margaret and she must know this surely will.”

“She’s beyond reason. Her feelings for Martha have driven out all other considerations.”

“But people deny their feelings all the time,” Jean said. “Isn’t that what parenthood is all about—sacrificing your happiness for your children’s?”

“I suppose she would say that’s what she has been doing these ten years—and she can’t do it anymore.”

“You are so reasonable, Howard. You should be raging and storming and demanding that she comes home.”

“I did try a version of that,” he admitted. “But it’s hard to rant at someone who is already on their knees, weeping their apologies. I felt like a brute.”

This image of Gretchen, abject and pleading, was too much for Jean.

“Don’t,” she said with a sense of guilt that was out of all proportion. “This is all my doing. I’ve brought this chaos into your lives.”

She felt a powerful and irrational hatred for Martha, her filthy kitchen, her pretensions to art, her scarlet lipstick, her scheming. And as she contemplated the wreckage of this once happy marriage, a dark corner of her soul registered that Howard himself was now, if not legally, then at least morally free, and her heart bounded with selfish joy.

“Well, if she’s gone to stay at Martha’s she won’t stick it for long. The place is a slum,” she said with uncharacteristic spite.

It was impossible to imagine the poised and fastidious Gretchen at home among that clutter.

“Really?” Howard’s face fell and Jean immediately regretted her remark. Of course it hardly flattered him to know what a reduction in circumstances she was running to. “I just can’t imagine her being happy there,” Jean added lamely.

The sky was darkening and they were passing Biggin Hill now, the airfield on their left, following the same route they had taken to Aunt Edie’s, weeks ago when life was straightforward. It seemed as though Howard might drive all night if she let him.

“Is there anything I can do that might help? Anything at all?” she asked, conscious that her intervention so far in the Tilbury marriage hardly recommended her for the role.

“She’ll need money,” Howard replied. “I wouldn’t like to think of her struggling or dependent on . . . someone else.”

“Only you would think like that.”

“I wonder if you would go and see her, give her some cash and check that she is all right. I know she won’t want to face me. I don’t even have an address for her.”

“Of course. If you think she’ll see me.”

“She’ll have to see someone. Margaret comes back on Saturday. She needs to be told.”