Little Clarendon was just round the corner from the Press and always crowded with people. Leaving my bike near the window of a tea shop, I took a table inside, waited for the waitress to bring me a pot of tea, then took the proofs from my satchel. There were seven double pages: three from Da, three from Mr. Dankworth and one from Ditte. Ditte’s was creased from its confinement in an ordinary envelope, but just like the others it was winged with comments and new entries written in her familiar hand. Dr. Murray had made additional notes against hers, agreeing or disagreeing—his opinion would always be the final edit.

The correction I was looking for was one of Da’s, an additional entry pinned to the proof’s edge. There was a ruler-straight line through every word and Mr. Dankworth had rewritten it. When? I wondered. And did Da know? I unpinned it from the proof.

I checked the pockets of my skirt and was pleased to find a small number of blank slips and the stub of a pencil. Like the skirt, neither had been used in a long while. I took a slip and rewrote the entry exactly as Da had composed it, then I pinned it where the original had been. I looked carefully at the rest of Da’s proofs and found two, three, four other occasions when Mr. Dankworth had interfered.

I began to rewrite Da’s original edits, my confidence increasing with every word, but when I came to the last, my hand froze. It was an entry for mother. The proof already gave the first meaning as A female parent, but to this Mr. Dankworth had added, A woman who has given birth to a child.

I left it.

November 1908

Lizzie looked up from where she was kneading dough at the kitchen table.

“There’s a troubled face if ever I saw one,” she said.

“I’ve made three mistakes this morning,” I said. “He makes me so nervous.” I slumped into a chair.

“Let me guess. Mr. Sweatman? Mr. Maling? Or could it be that you’re talking about Mr. Dankworth?”

Lizzie had been hearing versions of this complaint since we’d returned home from Shropshire a year before. I’d been escaping to her kitchen as often as I could. Usually she would work around me, but if there was a letter from Mrs. Lloyd she’d brew a fresh pot and place a plate of biscuits, morning-baked, between us as I read aloud. She was recreating her Shropshire mornings, and I was always careful not to insert myself between her and her friend. I’d read carefully, without comment or pause, and when I was done I would take a pen and paper from the kitchen drawer and wait for Lizzie to compose her response. My dearest Natasha, she would always start.