aStop ita. aStop what?a aStop being so melodramatic and putting me in the wronga.

aMelodramatic? Couldnat you have waited, knowing how I was feeling, seeing how I was feeling? Couldnat you just have exercised a bit of bloody tact?a Russell opened his eyes.

aProbably,a he said tiredly.

Matthew stooped to find a pen in his briefcase.

aHow much do you want?a aIt really doesnata"a aLook,a Matthew said, ayou started this, and itas all gone wrong, so letas finish it and get it over with. How much?a aI havenat talked to Muma"a aMum probably wouldnat talk about it anyway. This can be between you and mea.

aYou manage,a Russell said, ato make a perfectly reasonable adult request sound very sordida.

Matthew sat down on the edge of the bed and opened his chequebook and looked up at his father.

aDad?a Russell didnat look at him.

aTwo fifty all in, and as you know no ironing is done in this house unless you do it yourselfa.

Matthew wrote rapidly and then tore the cheque out of the book. He held it out.

aHerea.

aI do not want to take thisa"a aYou asked for ita.

aBut not this way. I didnat want it now. I just wanted to talk about it, raise the subject. I never meant it to get out of handa"a aIn my experience,a Matthew said, athe danger of things getting out of hand is there whenever anyone opens their mouthsa.

Russell folded the cheque into his hand.

aThank youa.

Matthew said nothing. He stood up and watched his father slowly turn and walk out of the room. Then he moved forward and closed the door firmly behind him.

aItas Ruth, isnat it?a Kate Ferguson said.

Ruth turned round. She was holding a small melon she had just taken from a pyramid on a market stall.

aIam Kate,a Kate said. aYou probably donat remember. Iam a friend of Rosaas, Matthewas sister. We met once, ages ago, at that concert in Brixton, wea"a aOh,a Ruth said. She transferred the melon to her other hand. aOh yes. Kate. Sorry, I was sort of concentratinga"a aWhat are you doing here?a Kate asked. aI thought you worked in the Citya"a Ruth put the melon back in its place on the pyramid.

aI do. But I live here nowa. She gestured out towards the edge of the market. She said, with a complicated kind of pride, aIave got a flat on Banksidea.

Kate hesitated. Something in Ruthas expression and tone was half expecting her to say, aWow. Lucky youa. But something else, at the same time, suggested that, even if Ruth would have loved such a straightforward reaction, she knew it was too luxurious to hope for.

Kate put out a hand and briefly touched Ruthas sleeve.

aActually,a she said, aRosa told me. Just a bita.

Ruth said quickly, aItas so brilliant here, all this air and views and location. And then, Borough Market on my doorstepa"a aI always shop here on Fridays,a Kate said. aI leave work early and come herea.

aYesa.

aGoodness knows what Iall do when I canata.

aCanat?a aAfter the babya.

Ruth looked at the swell under Kateas jacket. aOh, congratulationsa"a aItas a bit of a surprise,a Kate said. aWeave only been married a minute. Iam still rather shell-shocked. I keep thinking about being away from work, not coming here, not zipping out to the moviesa"a She looked at Ruthas black briefcase bag. aSorrya"a aWhy sorry?a aNot very tactfula.

Ruth said, aRosa told you about Matthew and me?a aYesa.

aWeall have to see how things work outa"a Kate nodded.

aItas just,a Ruth said in a rush, athat however enlightened you are, you both are, you still seem to be swimming against the norm. If youare a woman earning more than a mana. She glanced at Kate. aSorry. I donat know why I said thata. She looked round, at the fruit-and-vegetable stalls, at the surging crowds of people. aYou must think Iam mada"a aItas on your mind,a Kate said, alike being pregnantas on minea.

aWill you go back to work?a aYes,a Kate said, and then, in a different tone, aprobablya.

aI hope itas easy,a Ruth said earnestly.

aSo do I. Iam hopeless at being uncomfortable, never mind in paina"a aNo, I didnat mean that. I didnat mean having the baby. I meant afterwards. I meant I hope itas easy deciding what to do after the babya.

Kate gave her a smile.

aThank youa.

aI mean ita.

aI knowa"a aI never knew,a Ruth said, athat deciding was going to throw up such problems. I always thought decisions meant the end of something difficult, not the beginninga. She put a hand out and picked up the melon again. aWhy is the only way you learn something the hard way?a * * *

Edie was sitting sideways on a moulded plastic chair in the dimness at the edge of the hall. She had her arms along the back of the chair, and had leaned forward to rest her chin on them. About ten feet away, on the small bare stage illuminated by clumsy lights that had plainly been installed a very long time ago, Pastor Manders and the carpenter, Engstrand, were rehearsing the opening of Act Three. Engstrand was being played by an actor called Jim Driscoll who had, decades before, played Edieas comedy sidekick when she was presenting a childrenas television programme. He had been young and wiry and gingery then. He was older and skinny and greyish now, standing in front of Pastor Manders with a kind of obsequious malevolence that he seemed able to convey without uttering a syllable. He had his hands clasped in front of him, swinging slightly away from his stooped body, and his face was raised towards Ivor with a stretched and ingratiating smile. He managed to look, Edie thought, both simian and sophisticated. He managed, too, to look a very subtle kind of threat. She shifted a little in her uncompromising plastic chair. In a minute, she would have to go and join them. In a minute, Mrs Alving would come in from the garden, dazed by calamity, and say, in a voice Edie hadnat quite decided upon yet, aI canat get him away from the firea.

The fire, Freddie Cass had explained to Lazlo, was metaphorical as well as actual. The fire that burned the orphanage built in his dead fatheras name was also the fire that was consuming all the lies that had been told to protect him and, in the process, his own life as his inherited malady began to possess and then devour him. Edie could see that Lazlo loved this kind of direction, loved falling under the spell of such fatalism. Head come to find Edie afterwards, eyes shining.

aI know what itas about now, itas not just something thatas happening, itas something that had to happen, and you donat know it yet, as my mother, because youave always thought you could protect me, by telling lies, by keeping the truth from mea. He gave Edie a quick, fervent hug. aThis is amazinga.

He was sitting on the floor at the side of the stage now, in jeans and a shrunken grey T-shirt, hugging his knees and watching the others. His arms, wound round his knees, looked to Edie like a boyas arms, rather than a manas, not just because they were thin, but because they were slightly unformed, slightly tentative. Whether they were the result of Lazloas genetic make-up, or the result of the haphazard way he lived, was uncertain, but they lent a pathos to his absorption, a pathos that had been uppermost in Edieas mind ever since Rosa had telephoned and said, in the throwaway way she had, at the end of a conversation, aDayou know where Lazloas living?a aNo,a Edie said, awhy should I? Heas rather private about all of that. Somewhere in West Londona"a aKilburn,a Rosa said.

aWell,a Edie said, anot the perfect journey to work but not impossiblea"a aHe lives,a Rosa said, ain a room in someoneas grannyas house and she wonat open the windows because sheas panicked about burglars and it smells like a catas lavatorya.

aPoor boy. Why is he living there?a aItas all he can afforda"a aWhat about familya"a aAll over the place,a Rosa said, aand they donat carea.

aSurelya"a aMum,a Rosa said, ahe didnat tell me all of this. I had to get it out of hima.

aAnd why are you telling me?a aBecause,a Rosa said casually, aitas the sort of thing you like to knowa.

Edie sat up a little straighter and took her gaze off Lazloas arms. Then she put it back again. She thought of the house in Kilburn. She thought of Lazlo ravenously eating bagels after the first rehearsal. She thought of Lazlo taking off that T-shirt and devising some forlorn and unsatisfactory way to launder it. She thought of Matthew a" unhappy but somehow safe a" back in his own bedroom. She thought of Rosaas empty bedroom next to it, and Benas, on the floor below.

Freddie Cass turned towards her from the stage. He didnat, as was his custom, raise his voice.

aStage left, Edie, please,a he said.

aDear Laura,a Ruth wrote via email, aI need someone to talk to. Or someone to think aloud to. Please read this through to the end. Pleasea.

She paused and took her hands off the keyboard. She had set up a table a" trestle, black, very expensive considering its construction hardly differed from the table her father used for one of his meticulous wallpapering sessions a" in the window of her new sitting room so that she could glance up from her laptop and look out at her amazing view. There was nothing else much in her sitting room except the leather sofa a" which Matthew had insisted she take a" and a television and two tall metal lamps that threw their light modishly on to the ceiling.

aIt isnat that I donat want things,a shead written to Laura. aItas more a case of adjusting to buying them on my own. It feels as if everything in my life has suddenly sort of liquefied a" itas quite exciting but itas unnerving too. Perhaps I should just wait until Iave calmed down a bita.

Laura hadnat replied to that message for four days. Ruth knew she was writing a lot and had even explained, slightly mortifying though it was to have to do so, that without Matthew to talk to, and being in a very preoccupying and distressing situation, which required a lot of talk in order to attempt to get her thoughts in some kind of sequence, she needed both a listening ear and a response. Laura, mindful of the fact that Ruth had nursed her steadily through a variety of affairs and a broken engagement prior to the lawyer in Leeds, said that of course she was always there when needed. The trouble was, Ruth thought, staring at some gulls riding the wind above the river, that even if people were there, as it were, they werenat always there in the right spirit. Laura, however well-intentioned, inevitably had her spirit diverted by the prospect of her future, by the right fridge in her kitchen, the right music at her wedding. And I canat blame her, Ruth thought, I certainly canat resent her, but I havenat yet got to the point where I can work through my thinking by myself. If, indeed, I ever get there.

She looked back at the screen. aPlease,a shead written pleadingly. She could hear herself saying it.

aWhat I mean is,a she typed rapidly, aI need to get all this stuff out a" issues, as human resources at work call them a" and it would be very kind of you to read through to the end and even kinder to tell me if Iam mad or what passes for normal.

aLaura, three people now have accused me of being ambitious and I mean accused, not described (no, one of them isnat Matthew, but I think his mother is). A colleague (male) says he thinks of ambition as both a necessary and desirable part of his life, but when I think about it in relation to myself it seems to imply things I donat like at all, like egotism and selfishness and the manipulation of other people for my own ends. I want to tell people that being good at work isnat about me, itas about the work. But why do I want to? And why do I feel especially compelled to, now, because I have achieved this flat and lost Matthew in the process?

aAnd it gets worse. I donat just feel guilty about whatas happened, I feel resentful about feeling guilty. Nobody, Laura, not my colleagues, not my family, not even Matthew before all this happened, said well done about getting to this level at your age. Or even well done about getting to this level. We praise children now until they canat take failure of the smallest kind, so why canat we praise women for being good at things that arenat traditionally female? Why do women always, always have to be the givers? And if they stop giving, even for a minute, why is there this unspoken accusation that they have somehow surrendered on being truly female?

aLaura, I donat want to give up what Iam doing, I donat want to give up my opportunities. I canat believe that being accepted has to mean being frustrated too, but nor can I bear the thought that, if I make choices the way I just have, Iall end up without a man and without a family because Iam not, somehow, allowed to have both.

I donat want to downsize my ambition.

I want to live in this flat.

I want Matthew back.

Love, Rutha.

The restaurant Max had chosen to take Vivien to, for dinner, was one she had never been to before. It had a conservatory at the back, which, Max said, was opened up in summer to the paved garden behind and they put up big white Italian market umbrellas, and candle lamps in the trees, and it was really a very, very nice ambience indeed.

Vivien, walking carefully to the table in her new sandals, decided not to ask how Max knew so much about this restaurant, particularly by candlelight. In the four years they had lived apart, Vivien had been out with two men, neither of whom became more than perfunctory lovers, and Max had had, to her certain knowledge three, and to her sharp suspicion five girlfriends, all younger, all long-haired and all sexually available and active. Max had never mentioned any of them by name, but Vivien knew that one was called Carly and one was called Emma and one was an air hostess whom Max had met on a flight back from Chicago and who had subsequently, and annoyingly, engineered a very cheap flight for Eliot to get to Australia. Maybe Emma and Carly and the air hostess had all been to the restaurant with the conservatory, with Max. And maybe, even if they had, sitting down with him as still her legal husband gave Vivien a trump card that no amount of long hair and sexual ingenuity could deprive her of.

She sank into her chair and looked at Max across the candles.

aLovelya.

He indicated the menu.

Take a look at that. Have what you want. Have lobstera.

She smiled at him. He wore a pale suit and a strong blue shirt and he looked, Vivien thought, very distinguished. It was always a pleasure to see a man who looked after himself.

aI donat like lobster, Maxa.

He smiled back.

aNor you doa.

aWhat else donat I like?a He closed his eyes. aLet me thinka"a aGreen peppers,a Vivien said. aRhubarb. Coriandera. He opened his eyes. aBattenberg cakea. aBattenberg cake?a aYes,a he said.

aYou donat even know what it isa"a aI do,a Max said. aPink and yellow squares. I bought you some once, at a motorway place, on the way up to Scotland. You threw it out of the car windowa.

Vivien smiled delightedly.

aYou made that upa.

aNever. I remember it as if it was yesterday. Iave ordered champagnea. aChampagne!a aWhy not? Weare celebrating, arenat we?a She turned her head a little and looked at him coquettishly.

aAre we? What are we celebrating?a He winked.

aA little a" rapprochement, Vivia. Oh,a she said, ais that what this is?a A waiter put a small metal champagne bucket on the table between them. aGoodnessa"a aWhen did you last drink champagne?a aCanat remembera.

aWell, itas time you did. Itas time you lived again a little, Vivia.

The waiter poured champagne slowly into a tall, thin glass flute and set it ceremoniously in front of Vivien. aI bet he gives you champagne,a Rosa had said, waving Vivi off from the sofa, in her tracksuit. aI bet you get the works tonighta.

Max raised his glass.

aToa"a he said, and stopped.

Vivien waited. aTo Eliot,a Max said.

aOf course,a Vivien said, a fraction too eagerly. She raised her glass, too, and touched Maxas with it. aTo Eliota.

aWhat about this Ro?a Vivien made a small face.

aWell, you have to remember that what suits an Australian beach wouldnat suit Richmonda.

aCome on,a Max said, athis isnat like you. Come on, Vivia.

Vivien looked up.

aIave never spoken to hera.

aNor mea.

aSheas learning to be a Buddhista. aA Buddhist,a Max said. aOh pleasea. aBut she surfs and drinks beera"a aAll you could ask, reallya. aNow, Maxa"a aWeall let it go, shall we,a Max said. aFor now?a aWe?a aYes, we. Heas our son, remembera. Vivien took a small sip of her champagne. aAnd the diving?a aMy feeling is,a Max said, ato let that go for now too. If heas still doing it, and only it, when heas thirty, weall fly out and give him a rocketa.

aArenat you going to see him before heas thirty?a Max looked straight at her.

aAny time youare ready, weall go out and see hima.

Vivien smiled at her champagne glass.

aOha.

aSay the word,a Max said. Vivien leaned back in her chair. She said, looking away across the restaurant, aWhat happened to the air hostess?a aShe went back to her airlinea.

aAnd,a Vivien said, feeling a small and happy surge of confidence, ayou didnat replace her?a aOh, I tried,a Max said, aI tried like anythinga. aShould I know about this?a He put his head on one side.

aOnly if you want to be very bored. As bored as I got. What are you going to eat?a aGuessa.

He looked down at the menu. aAvocado and red mulleta. aThere,a she said, ayou havenat forgottena. aNo,a he said, aI havenata.