‘Are you going to let me read it?’

‘Yes, of course.’

‘Aside from anything else, I’d like to double-check all the facts.’

‘Actually, Clive’s friend Arnold has already done that. He’s the ARP regional commander for Westminster.’

‘Oh.’

‘He even helped to find me a publisher.’ She was reaching down into her bag as she spoke.

‘You’ve found a publisher?’

Avril straightened up. ‘Here we are!’ she said, brightly, holding up a small black book. ‘It’s out just after Christmas.’

Winnie stared at her twin. It was unprecedented for Avril to have delayed the announcement of such thrilling news; when Clive had proposed by moonlight, she’d sent Winnie a telegram that evening.

‘This is your very own copy, Twinnie,’ said Avril, avoiding her eye. ‘Do take it.’

It was a typical wartime edition, meanly bound and lacking a dust jacket. Winnie looked at the red lettering on the spine. ‘Avril Bridge?’

‘We decided that Clive’s surname is too distinctive. Some of the plot is quite near the knuckle.’

Winnie opened the cover and read the brief synopsis.

Belinda Holdsworth, raised in a comfortable London home, has, in her twenty-one years, encountered little to disturb or enlighten her. Her route from naivety to a bitter understanding of the facts of love and war is the subject of this tense and important novel.

‘Tense and important,’ she repeated, unwillingly impressed. ‘Is that a quote from someone?’

‘No,’ said Avril, ‘I wrote that, but I’m getting some awfully good reviews as well. Lilliput magazine says that I’m the first fresh fictional voice of the war, and New Thought says that my prose feels like an inoculation of truth.’

‘Blimey.’ Winnie started to leaf through the book. ‘Do you know what the phrase “inoculation of truth” reminds me of?’

‘No, what?’

Winnie straightened her shoulders and tuned her voice to a foghorn. ‘“Say not the needle is the most proper pen for women.”’

‘I beg your pardon?’

‘Don’t you remember? It was one of Miss Simpkin’s quotes when we were in the Amazons. Together with “Abused patience turns to fury.”’

‘I’d forgotten,’ said Avril. ‘Don’t read the book now, though – let’s not waste time when we could be talking. How’s Emlyn?’

‘Oh, he’s—’ Winnie frowned and turned back a page. ‘Binnie,’ she said, staring at the top paragraph. ‘Binnie?’

‘It’s short for Belinda.’

‘“Binnie, for God’s sake, come back to bed.”’

‘No, don’t read it out loud.’

‘“A flare lit the room through the uncurtained window and an illusive surge of green light, unsounding, sentient, filled the space.”’

‘Please don’t.’ Avril reached for the book, but Winnie leaned away from her, still reading, her tone incredulous.

‘“Roderick’s profile had an ancient blankness, as of a frieze in a torch-lit passageway. Binnie turned, silently, knelt on the mattress and slid her cushioned form alongside his. ‘If we died now there’d be no more pretence,’ she said. She imagined their two bodies fused by violence into one melded, bloodied being, ensexed eternally.”’

Winnie caught the eye of the couple at the next table, both listening avidly. ‘Are you enjoying it?’ she asked. ‘It’s about me.’ The man turned pink.