“Do you like my name?” she asked him as they sat down to their traditional Friday supper of pork chops and butter beans.

“Atwater?” he said. “Yes, it has a good solid ring to it. Are you thinking of keeping it? The only thing is, it’d get complicated when the children start going to school.”

“Not Atwater,” she said. “Emma. Do you like Emma?”

“Emma.” He thought. “Yes, I suppose I do. I mean, it’s you, isn’t it, and I like you. Is that your pork chop? It’s a midget. Why didn’t you get a bigger one?”

“I’m trying not to gain weight,” she said. “I sometimes wonder if Emma’s a bit … I don’t know … dull as a name. Don’t you sometimes wish I was called Josephine instead?”

He smiled. “Or Choo-Choo,” he said. Last Sunday evening, back in that now barely imaginable time of innocence, they had been able to laugh about Choo-Choo. “You’ll starve to death on that, it’s the smallest chop I’ve ever seen. Do you want some of mine?”

“No I don’t,” she said now, irritated. “And I’m not talking about choo-choo.” Choo-Choo, the untainted little girl who wore sturdy sandals fastened by a buckle to school and who afterwards went home to a clean conscience and a younger sister who loved her to pieces. “I’m talking about Josephine. It’s such a pretty name. The other day I saw a pair of shoes on Upper Street called Josephine.”

“What do you mean?” he said.

“What do you mean, what do I mean?” she said.

“What do you think I mean? You were walking down Upper Street and a pair of shoes came up to you and said, ‘Good afternoon, our name’s Josephine, could you please tell us where we catch the Number 19 into town?’ Were they tourists? Did they have an American accent? Did you call them Choo-Choo, and did they kick you?”

“They were in a shopwindow, Matthew. Designer shoes. They have names, you know.”

“Do they? I didn’t know that.”

“Well, they do. And these were called Josephine. And they were …” She paused, and, despite herself, her voice caught a little. “They were the most beautiful shoes I’ve ever seen,” she finished.

Matthew laid down his knife and fork. Emma did not generally fish for compliments, but it was clear that something gallant was expected of him here.

“You don’t need beautiful shoes, Emma,” he said. “Your legs are good enough without them.”

Emma rose. “If you had wracked your brains all day,” she said, “you could not have come up with a less sensitive or more hurtful thing to say to me. Enjoy your dinner. I’m going to visit Mom.”

She made for the door to the kitchen, where she turned.

“And I’m taking a taxi,” she added defiantly, before closing the door in his bewildered face.

On the other side of Islington, Fee was standing in her own kitchen fixing her favorite solitary supper of vegetable barley soup and a chicken sandwich when she heard a car draw up in front of the house, followed by light footsteps and the impatient scrabbling of a key at the front door.