There’s a long silence as images from the past come hurtling back. The pram, always the pram beneath the tamarind tree and me gazing up into the branches and listening to the birds. I’d drunk two large pink gins over lunch and was feeling tipsy. I didn’t tell the policeman, though one of the servants might have done. I remember I’d been feeling relieved that at last Elvira had gone to sleep. I won’t pretend I didn’t find her crying hard to bear. It wasn’t the sound so much, although it could drive a mother crazy, it was the fact that no matter what I did I couldn’t help her. The doctor said it was probably colic and it would pass but I felt helpless listening to her pitiful cries.

‘You’ve done well,’ Simone says and tucks her arm into mine. ‘Are you all right?’

I’m only half listening, but I come back to the present, nod, and then hand back the picture.

‘Tomorrow,’ she says with a confident smile as she helps me up, ‘I think we might get Mrs Wilkes to donate some stale bread and then we’ll feed the ducks on the pond. What do you think?’

‘Lovely,’ I say. But what I mean is really? Can I really get as far as the pond?

32.

Righteous indignation fuelled Belle’s footsteps as she marched away from Oliver’s apartment building. Silently fuming, she barely noticed the usual mix of people, vehicles and animals in the streets, nor was she aware of the sun high in the sky and the sweat trickling down her back. All she could think was that she would definitely go to Sydney after all, leave everything else behind – leave him behind – certain now it was the only thing to do.

By the time she’d regained her composure she glanced about and found she had ended up in an unfamiliar area of the city riddled with alleyways. She came to a stop when a huddle of Burmese men, dressed only in skirts, blocked her path. One man was painting black signs on the bare chest of another and more waited in line, eager to be ornamented. Engrossed in this strange activity, they paid Belle no attention. As more men attached themselves to the group Belle sidled past and headed for what she hoped was the road leading to the Secretariat. She wanted to find Edward to tell him she was delighted to accept Clayton Rivers as her agent.