There was a picture of President Kennedy in the other paper. Mummy liked him. Diana thought he was handsome. Mrs Kennedy was almost as pretty as Mummy, but not quite.

‘There you are little one. Hungry?’ Mrs Hoskine walked through the front door carrying a broom.

‘Yes.’

‘Permanently, it seems to me.’ She raised an eyebrow. ‘It appears we have mice because there was a scone missing this morning.’

‘Really?’ Diana opened her eyes wide.

‘You know it’s best to tell the truth.’

Diana looked down. ‘Sorry, Mrs Hoskine. I ate a scone last night because I was very hungry.’

Mrs Hoskine ruffled her hair. ‘That’s better my little one. Now let’s see to some breakfast for you.’

Diana trailed behind her into the kitchen where she first smelt, then saw, fresh bread. ‘Bread and butter, please, with jam.’

‘Of course.’ She sliced a piece and Diana layered it with butter and jam. The bread was warm enough that the butter melted right in and dripped down her chin. Mrs Hoskine wiped her face with a clean tea-towel. ‘Is that enough for now or do you need more?’

‘Enough for now, thank you.’ Diana dashed out of the kitchen and went straight to the piano. She put the music away that was out from last night and pulled hers out of the seat. She was about to begin warming her fingers up, as Madame Roscova had taught her, when she thought of her diary. She needed to write in it.

She raced back upstairs and pulled it out from under her mattress. She had been puzzled to find it on her bedside table this morning. But then she’d looked in it and there was a pencil line dragged down one page. She must have fallen asleep writing. Mummy would have put it on the table. She knew it was Mummy and not Daddy because of the pencil placement. It was tucked just inside the cover. She did that with her own notebook. Mummy wrote in hers all the time. It was like a diary of sorts, except hers was all about food and clothes and people.

Peering out of the bedroom window, the sun was making steam come off the lawn. It was going to be a wonderful day for sailing. She put her diary under her arm. Today she would bring it with her and record everything that she saw. Maybe she would have another piece of bread, butter and jam before she practised the piano. Madame Roscova had told Diana she must practise every day and that she wanted to know all about her holiday in England. Recording everything in the diary would make it easier to remember. There was nothing that happened here that she couldn’t tell Madame Roscova. She had to think hard in Moscow during her lessons, focusing on her finger placement and what she could and couldn’t talk about. It was tricky but she did her best.

26

Diana

4 August, 1962 7.10 a.m.