She undid the ribbon, spread the wrapping paper. He had used the portrait he had drawn of her. Inside was a smaller packet, covered in waxed paper.

‘Please use it when I visit,’ he said. ‘Sweet violet. Soft on your skin. We can imagine we are lovers and you will remember me by the scent.’

Savon de Violette. She pressed it against her nose, breathed in the flowery aroma, fingered the soft wax, the powdery crumbs.

‘Frohe Weihnachten,’ he said. ‘Happy Christmas.’

She cried. Soft on your skin. He had noticed. Cared.

Chapter Twelve: Joe

CHAPTER TWELVE

JOE

Jersey: June 1985

Joe couldn’t get the image of Trude out of his mind. It was a solemn likeness, an official mugshot, the sort you have for a passport. Unsmiling, face-on, stiff-necked. Joe sat in his caravan all afternoon, tried to distract himself. He made the bed, cleaned the kettle, repaired the faulty window catch. But the photograph sat like a magnet, drawing him back. Trude. Did he feel for her now? Well, for sure, but not the way Geoffrey still had feelings for Dora.

At teatime, he went over to the house to make dinner. There was bacon, eggs, tomatoes in the pantry, a tin of mini frankfurters left over from Christmas, some Co-op baked beans and a bit of black pudding. Cold potatoes from yesterday. He lifted the old cast-iron frying pan onto the Aga, melted the lard, flicked the sausages and bacon over as they hissed and spat.

Ate in silence, dipping bread and butter into the yolk of the egg, knife squeaking on the plate as he sliced into the bacon, wiping the tomato juice from his mouth with the back of his hand.

He looked up: Geoffrey was studying him.

‘Would you mind telling me what’s going on,’ he said. ‘Have you bankrupted us?’

‘No.’ Joe looked up. ‘Why do you say that?’

‘Because,’ Geoffrey was smiling, ‘I’ve never seen you so distracted. Have you seen a ghost?’

Joe stood up and filled the kettle for their tea. ‘Perhaps,’ he said.

‘And would it have anything to do with the letter you received today?’

‘How did you know I had a letter?’

Geoffrey laughed. ‘The postman told me. Said it was from England. Said the sender had a German name and he wondered what you were doing, corresponding.’

Joe poured the water into the teapot. ‘It’s none of his business.’

‘He’s curious. You’ve lived like a hermit for forty years and suddenly have a penfriend. That’s how he sees it. Thinks you have a fancy woman.’

‘Why does he think it’s a German?’

‘Hummel. He said that’s a German name.’

‘Does he now,’ Joe said.