‘Oh, I didn’t know. Yes, I’ll be there.’ She paused. ‘Why do you want to see her?’

He looked up sharply. ‘I don’t know.’ And he had no idea why. He knew there was very little chance of her communicating anything he didn’t already know. And it was only then that he realized she had been flitting around the edge of his consciousness all day. A small, clumsy, barefoot child whose cold hands had touched his face in the darkness. Then he remembered something else.

‘The other night, when I came back drunk. Did I . . . Did we . . .?’

She smiled at his unusual bashfulness. ‘No,’ she said. ‘We didn’t.’ She hesitated, then, ‘I could stay tonight.’

‘No, I’ll take you home.’ He said it a little too quickly and it hurt her, and he realized too late his mistake.

‘Fine.’

‘Look, I didn’t mean . . .’

‘You don’t have to apologize.’

There was an awkward silence, then Bannerman asked, ‘You want some more wine?’

‘No, it’s getting late.’

He fumbled absently in his pocket and then frowned. ‘The police brought Slater’s car back. I saw it outside. But I guess I don’t have the keys.’

‘They’re on the mantelpiece.’ Sally crossed the room. ‘They must have put them through the letter box. I found them lying on the floor in the hall when I came in. But don’t bother, I’ll phone a taxi.’ He would have argued, but he saw in her face that she would not be argued with. And he thought, I could love you.

*

It was fifteen minutes before the taxi came and parp-parped down in the street. They’d had time to finish the wine and say many things. They had done neither. ‘I’ll come down with you.’

‘Don’t bother.’

‘I’ll come down with you.’

He helped her on with her coat and they walked down the stairs in silence. The taxi was revving impatiently at the kerb, clouds of exhaust fumes rising into the darkness. She stopped in the doorway and relented, turning to kiss him quickly on the lips. He held her arm to stop her from going. ‘Did you . . . did you get the job in Rome?’

She looked at him quizzically for a moment. ‘I don’t know. They said they’d be in touch. See you tomorrow.’

He watched her climb into the taxi. The car purred off down the Rue de Commerce, leaving black tyre tracks in the thin layer of snow, and he wondered if she would always be leaving.

Back in the apartment all that remained of her were lingering traces of her perfume and the faintest smear of lipstick on her empty glass. He finished the wine, drinking slowly, listening to the clock ticking in the silence and feeling the dull ache in the stiffening muscles of his right arm.

IV