He appeared in the sitting room doorway, startled. “A drive? Are you sure?”

“James, I haven’t forgotten how.”

“Sweetheart, you’re exhausted.”

“I’m tired of being exhausted.”

The Hillman started first time. I steered my way out to the junction and turned onto the seafront. The sea was gray under the falling dusk. Once I had driven along another promenade under a big bright moon, a giggly girl in her father’s car. Scaring a fighter pilot half to death when she tried to hit a hundred. That car was sold now, and the pilot had given up his trade. The giggly girl thought she’d never laugh again.

A lorry was coming straight at me. I stamped on my brakes, he on his. We met face-to-face, the driver swearing out of a square furious mouth. I pulled straight into a parking place on the seafront, shaking. “God!” I shouted, and banged the steering wheel with my fists. “Why do we have to drive on the left?” I opened the window and in came the sea roar and the wind, blasting spittings of spray in my face. “Why?” I shouted again. “Why!”

—

James was so relieved to see me back. “That was very brave,” he said.

“Not at all. I don’t know why I didn’t think of it before.” I put the keys back in the drawer. “I might go out again. Every week or so, perhaps. Can we afford the petrol, do you suppose?”

“Of course we can.”

“Of course we can,” I echoed, desolate. “What’s a few gallons of petrol compared to the cost of a child.”

He closed his eyes. The lids trembled. His mouth was lipless.

I grasped him. “James, darling—”

“No, no,” he said mechanically, patting my shoulder. “I’m perfectly all right.”

I drew away so I could view him. “I don’t think so.”

“We simply need a little more time.” His eyes were wide open now, fixed on a point next to me. “Then we’ll be able to put it behind us.”

He was referring to the tragedy, of course, when he said “it.” But he still sounded as if he meant Catherine herself. That somehow we would put the baby behind us.

I could not think of her behind me. Or in any place except my arms.

—

The next time I got behind the wheel I made it all the way to the harbor. The driving seat was a good place to mourn, it turned out.