He levelled his field glasses towards the spinney. Nobody had ever been curious about him, asked him what he thought. Trude was the first. Question after question. No one had ever really gone out of their way to be his friend before. Intimate. He didn’t bare his soul to Pierre, not in the way it seemed he could do with Trude. He liked that. It broke his isolation. There was nothing wrong with that. Maybe she understood him.

It was difficult to tell how old she was. She had a face that would look the same at twenty as at fifty. Plain as a pavement. Round as a muffin. But her skin was unlined and her hands were young. Clean hands, unchafed. Most of the women he knew from home had raw, chapped hands, coarsened by the soil or the washtub. Hers were smooth and small. She had fine bones, vulnerable in their film of skin and dimpled flesh. ‘Stout’ was the word his mother would have used. Joe preferred chubby, a little chubby.

‘Actually,’ he said. ‘There is something you can do.’ One of the nuns was a diabetic but they were running out of insulin. ‘You’re a nurse, aren’t you?’

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘You know I am. Why?’

Nothing ventured, nothing gained. His mouth was dry, so he licked his lip, swallowed. ‘Could you see your way round to letting me have a phial or two of insulin?’

Trude frowned. ‘You know I can’t do that,’ she said. She was wearing slacks, the colour of acorns. She ran her hands down the creases, smiled. ‘But I’ll see what I can do. On one condition. Will you bring me here again?’

Joe hadn’t thought about sharing this, but Trude was so enchanted by it.

‘Perhaps,’ he said.

‘This will be our special place, for the birds,’ she said. ‘And no one else. Do you ever come at night?’

‘Well, no.’ Joe was surprised she had asked. ‘We’re bound by the curfew.’

‘I forgot,’ she said. ‘Silly me. But I’m not. I could come. Look for nightjars.’

Joe laughed. ‘You’d be lucky to see one of those.’

‘I could try. Tell you all about it. Would you mind?’

Well, Joe thought, put like that, it would be churlish to say no.

Every time they met it was like the first day. A smile dancing on her lips as if she was pleased to see him. Joe could just make it out. He wanted to place his finger under her chin, lift up her face, look at me. He was pleased to see her too, though that surprised him. Shocked him. He thought about her when she wasn’t there, talked to her in his head. She was a devilment that had entered into his soul and he should cast her behind him. But he was weak, he knew that now. And was it so sinful, to have a friend?