It stings, but what does it matter? I’m going to kill the Director and put a stop to all this nonsense. Then Jorzy will see that I’m not a kid any more; I’m a man. I just have to pick my moment. It has to be right.

When I reach the garden this morning, Boss is sitting outside, his boots in a patch of dew-laden grass, a mug of steaming chicory in his hand. His glance, when he looks up, is anxious. He waves a letter in my direction. “From my sister,” he says forlornly.

“Yeah?”

He hands me the sheet of paper, and I frown at the lines of ant-like scribble. Dear Valerie, This may come as a shock but I have decided to … A cool weight sinks down my spine. The Caucasas.

Boss wipes a hand across his forehead in a gesture of despair. “What can I say to her?”

Drawing up the other crate, I sit down and hand the letter back to Boss. His brooding glance surveys the rows of vegetables that march away from where we sit. All that hard work, for the Director’s benefit.

The sun is just coming up, sending beams of yellow light through the trellis fence that separates the kitchen garden from the rest of the grounds. A figure passes across one of the top windows of the house – one of the bedrooms, as I now know.

“I mean, she’s got a perfectly good room where she lives, people who care about her, and none of us is getting any younger.” Boss takes a mouthful of chicory, grimacing as if it’s too bitter. “What’s she want to go off to this place for?”

Boss gazes at the letter. It’s obvious he’s read over it several times. He probably got it late yesterday, after I went home, and spent the night brooding over its contents. With his sister gone, Boss won’t have anybody left in Ursa.

“The other day,” he mumbles, “when the Director … I had no idea. I’d have said something, otherwise. I mean …”

Embarrassed, I realise he’s at a loss for words. I get up, wanting to be busy, away from his clumsy grief. He sits unmoving as I fetch the fork from the shed and go down to the potato patch. There are plants to be dug up, potatoes to be put into sacks for the cellar. Somebody has to do it. They aren’t going to bag themselves.

When I next look up, Boss is coming out of the shed dressed in his suit. Without a word, not even to give me a list of chores, he leaves the garden, heading for the towpath.

19