‘I wasn’t.’ He shouts it. ‘I told you, I wasn’t.’

Isla rests her head back on her knees. In the part-light she sees unopened post on the doormat, soiled with the tread of her lace-up boots. Her bike, leaning against the wall, its basket stuffed with junk mail. On a hook by the door, the smart coat with the belt that she wears to the office. All of it familiar, unchanged.

‘Are you there?’

‘I’m here,’ she says.

‘Sorry to snap at you.’

‘Dad.’ She feels hot, but her skin is cold. Her pyjamas cling to her. ‘What was her name?’

He hesitates. ‘Mandy.’

Mandy. Isla smells a hot iron against cotton sheets. Eucalyptus.

‘She looked after you a few days a week, before you started school. Back when your mum was working at Hordern & Sons.’

‘She had a washing line strung out across her yard,’ Isla says, remembering as she speaks. ‘I used to hand her the pegs when she hung out her laundry.’

‘Did you?’

Isla can’t recall Mandy’s face but she remembers being in her presence. Being liked by someone she liked. An easiness about her company that made other people seem less than her.

‘Your mother wants to cancel the party for my birthday,’ he continues. ‘She’s been upset since the police called round. She can’t put it out of her mind.’

A door slams in one of the flats upstairs. Raised voices. Isla sits up. She understands now why he called.

‘Does she believe you, Dad?’

‘I don’t think so. No.’

She cradles the phone. New connectors are opening in her brain these past few weeks, fuelled by mineral water and sleep. Unbidden memories startle her on the bus; on the escalator at Bethnal Green; as she sits in traffic on the Essex Road. Her life has an awful clarity now the protective, hungover fug is gone. She sits cross-legged on the carpet, in the middle of her life, in its crisp, central crease. She is thirty-five years old, tall and lean; striking, people say. A body that has been neglected but is still strong, surprisingly resilient. A thick head of hair, cropped short at the back; blonde strands on top that grow up and out, like a dandelion. A woman whose life took a nosedive, who is getting herself together, who needs to be careful. Whose father is silent at the end of the line, asking her wordlessly to come home.

‘I could come back for a couple of weeks,’ she says. It’s the only thing to say. ‘I could help with the party. Get Mum to see sense.’

‘Could you?’

‘I think so. I’m owed some leave.’

‘That would be wonderful, Isla.’ His voice has lifted. ‘What about the apartment? Aren’t you buying a place?’

The apartment. A two-bed on Sinclair Road with high ceilings and a Juliet balcony. It’s beautiful, well-located and well over budget. They exchange in three weeks. She rubs her forehead with the heel of her hand. ‘I can deal with it over the phone,’ she says.