The waiter pointed over his shoulder to where three men were setting up. A fiddle, a trumpet and a drum. The tables where we sat were being cleared to make a dance floor. I was so relieved, I nearly giggled. Lucien picked up our drinks and moved us to a booth.

‘Don’t sit down. You want to dance, don’t you?’

‘I didn’t have you down as a dancer?’

‘Nor am I, but I thought you might enjoy it. You’ve been pensive.’

He was right; I hadn’t said much since we’d arrived. I didn’t want to seem ungrateful – not after all he’d done to help me – but even so. I could see the women in the corner. They were watching me intently. If I tried to dance here and now, I would stumble, lose my footing. I’d had all the confidence in the world dancing as Amazonia for the Crillick’s crowd, but now, among my own people, I was too scared to put one foot in front of the other. How badly I’d debased myself. All that cavorting, and when Lucien was watching too. I didn’t think I’d be dancing for a very long time.

‘Bill will be here soon, won’t he? I wouldn’t want to miss him.’

‘As you wish.’

‘We could talk instead?’

‘You never said what you thought about the lecture the other night.’

‘It was very interesting. I’d like to hear more, I think.’

In all of the drama at the docks, and with Ellen and Vincent, Sierra Leone had been pushed right from my mind, but now Lucien mentioned it I remembered how much it had excited me to hear about it. The kola nut he’d given me. It must still be in Vincent’s room at Crillick’s house unless Grace had thrown it away. That evening with Lucien at the lecture had been the last time I remembered feeling happy, learning about Africa and knowing I could call on Elvira when I needed her. Lucien had told me so much about himself too, as we walked around the Trafalgar Square fountain. I knew how I would have felt if I’d told him all my past and then he’d gone missing. I owed him a confidence if I wanted to get closer to him.

What was the best way to get all this across to him, I wondered, but right now there wasn’t time. Gus was signalling to us from behind the bar. Black Bill had arrived.