On her knees, Bea sorted through the stripy holdalls and bin bags, with the smell of strangers’ cupboards getting into her nose and hair, poking and rummaging and folding. There was on expensive coat with a cleaning ticket pinned to it that went straight onto the rail. There were a lot of baby clothes. Meticulous and gentle, Bea sorted them by size, from very tiny to small. But Veena said people were fussy about baby clothes, and would not buy them. She put them aside. Occasionally the bell on the door would ring.

‘Morning,’ she heard Veena say.

She could not see but she heard, and pictured the people from their voices. Shoppers with children. The old and the unwell. The lonely. Bea, kneeling among limp mountains of clothes, listened. The weather. Their pets. The news. And her mind travelled to the unknown of their lives.