‘But can he get out?’

I thought for a minute. ‘Yes. The windows open at the top. Yes, he can get out.’

‘He won’t get burned, by the fire?’

‘No. He’s perfectly safe.’

But the truth was, I wasn’t sure. Once it was in, would a bird be able to find that crack in the window again? Or would it spend the whole of its pigeon-life in the roof of the turbine hall, disorientated, deafened by the power of the place?

seven

Summer, 1979

It seemed there was no shade, even beneath the leaves of the lilac I’d grown all along the back fence. Its patches of purple froth were mostly over, and the tiny flowers were beginning to brown in the sun.

My garden was a glory in that June sunshine. We’d had nothing but good weather since May, and it was taking me an hour to water back and front every evening. I’d taken to watering in the early morning, too, before work. Six o’clock and I’d be out of bed, leaving Kathryn to sleep on for an hour. It was the most delicious freedom to me, padding out into the garden in my slippers, feeling the cool air edging through the gap in my dressing gown. As I worked my way around the garden with the can, the grass soaking my slippers, I saw the soil lighten and the petals begin to loosen as they warmed in the sun.

By then I was growing chrysanthemums and dahlias for show. I loved their pompom shape, the tight perfection of the petals. I loved the way earwigs hid inside the flowers, clinging on in their dark caves, even when you shook the stems. Kathryn said the chrysanthemums looked like soldiers wearing bright fur hats, they were so straight and striking when they bloomed. I had a whole bed, growing nicely up their canes. ‘Golden Gem’, ‘Cecilia’ and butter-yellow ‘Hansel’.

Robert was nine. Whenever he went into the garden, even if Kathryn was there, I watched him. I heard my own voice become repetitive and scolding, but I couldn’t stop the words coming. Mind those seedlings. I’ve planted a shrub there, don’t tread on it. Don’t pick the leaves off my box.

Kathryn had suggested I teach him respect for the garden by showing him how to love it. ‘Teach him how to grow things,’ she said.

So he’d chosen a packet of sunflowers, ‘Teddy Bear’ variety, which I expected to give us double blooms and good height, and I’d brought them on in the greenhouse.

Now it was Saturday morning, and, as Kathryn had started work again at the library, we were on our own until lunchtime. The seedlings were ready to plant out, and I wondered where I could find a place for Robert in the garden. It had to be away from the dahlia bed. In the end, I decided on a patch by the shed, where it wouldn’t really matter what happened. Using the imprint of my boots in the mud, I measured out the plot. One, two, three, four. Turn, and the same again.