Lucy had put down the phone almost wordlessly—couldn’t find a single throwaway line. In two days? Nor would he reveal what he was wearing, and she was anxious not to clash unintentionally with him. So with Grace’s help, she had settled on Ariadne—she with the threads, and the thing for a clever prince. Grace mischievously thought it was appropriate. She suggested a classical costume could be draped to disguise the worst of her scars, but still show off her friend’s best physical attributes—her beautiful dark Greco-Roman hair and face, long neck, and petite, feminine body.

“Isn’t that the whole idea?” Grace had pointed out drily.

Now, in something of a panic dictated by the clock, she adjusted her final pins and pearled clips: two tendrils of black hair curled either side of her face, the rest pulled up in a winding plait over her head, emphasizing her lovely neck and shoulders. The divided cream silk of the classical costume, which she had thrown together with considerable artistry in record time, hinted discreetly at her breasts. She was a talented seamstress. The silk jersey flowed over her reflection, giving a liquid elegance to the apparition, and Grace pronounced it magical. In spite of the need for haste, Lucy had sewn parts of herself into the dress, finishing it with baroque pearls. This was not only for Alex, but for something she could hardly express. Yet now that the “proper date” was on her, she felt strangely inert, regarding her own face in the mirror.

“Wear the Jimmy Choos, Lucy.” Grace woke her abruptly from the spell. “Since your doctor is a little over six feet tall, they’ll lend you the height you need, you’ll look like a movie star, and you can still walk in them.” Her friend took control and reassured Lucy’s nervous visage that she looked quite beautiful: “But get a leg on, or there is no slipper on earth that can save Cinderella from utterly missing the whole occasion.”

Lucy glanced at her watch with horror, grabbed her wrap and bag, and almost sprinted down the stairs out into Prince of Wales Drive. She thought of her racing heart and slowed down just a touch—thinking she’d give the doctors an immediate crisis instead of a night off. She hoped a taxi would somehow just appear or she’d be chronically late.

Her wishes were horses, and a taxi—white to match her outfit—made a neat U-turn on Chelsea Embankment and dropped her at the pier head. She hesitated on the pavement. At the gate stood the Grim Reaper. The costume was alarmingly vivid in detail; it looked almost as if its wearer had also come straight from work—calling the dead in another world. She felt a curious sense of dread.