He was astonished and flattered that this attractive young woman would have walked through the evening to find him and offer herself as an ally.

"Would you like a cup of tea or coffee, Kay?" asked Tessa.

"Oh, thanks very much," said Kay. "Tea, please, Tessa. No sugar."

Fats was in the kitchen, helping himself from the fridge. He ate copiously and continually, but remained scrawny, never putting on an ounce of weight. In spite of his openly declared disgust for them, he seemed unaffected by Tessa's pack of ready-filled syringes, which sat in a clinical white box next to the cheese.

Tessa moved to the kettle, and her thoughts returned to the subject that had consumed her ever since Sukhvinder had suggested it earlier: that Fats and Krystal were "seeing each other." She had not questioned Fats, and she had not told Colin.

The more that Tessa thought about it, the more certain she was that it could not be true. She was sure that Fats held himself in such high regard that no girl would be good enough, especially a girl like Krystal. Surely he would not...

Demean himself? Is that it? Is that what you think?

"Who's here?" Fats asked Tessa, through a mouthful of cold chicken, as she put on the kettle.

"A woman who wants to help Dad get elected to the council," replied Tessa, foraging in the cupboard for biscuits.

"Why? Does she fancy him?"

"Grow up, Stu," said Tessa crossly.

He plucked several slices of thin ham out of an open pack and poked them, bit by bit, into his crammed mouth, like a magician inserting silk handkerchiefs into his fist. Fats sometimes stood for ten minutes at a time at the open fridge, ripping open clingfilm and packets and putting chunks of food directly into his mouth. It was a habit Colin deprecated, along with almost every other aspect of Fats' behavior.

"Why's she want to help him, seriously?" he asked, having swallowed his mouthful of meat.

"She wants the Bellchapel Addiction Clinic to stay open."

"What, a junkie, is she?"

"No, she isn't a junkie," said Tessa, noting with annoyance that Fats had finished the last three chocolate biscuits and left the empty wrappings on the shelf. "She's a social worker, and she thinks the clinic is doing a good job. Dad wants to keep it open, but Miles Mollison doesn't think it's very effective."

"It can't be doing that well. The Fields are full of glue-sniffers and smackheads."

Tessa knew that if she had said that Colin wanted to close the clinic, Fats would have instantly produced an argument for its continuation.

"You ought to be a barrister, Stu," she said as the kettle lid started to rattle.

When Tessa returned to the sitting room with her tray, she found Kay talking Colin through a sheaf of printed material she had brought out of her big tote bag.

"...two drugs workers part funded by the council, and partly by Action on Addiction, which is a really good charity. Then there's a social worker attached to the clinic, Nina, she's the one who gave me all this - oh, thanks very much," said Kay, beaming up at Tessa, who had set down a mug of tea on the table beside her.

Kay had taken to the Walls, in just a few minutes, as she had not taken to anybody else in Pagford. There had been no sweeping up-and-down glance from Tessa as she walked in, no gimlet-eyed assessment of her physical imperfections and dress sense. Her husband, though nervous, seemed decent and earnest in his determination to obstruct the abandonment of the Fields.

"Is that a London accent, Kay?" asked Tessa, dunking a plain biscuit in her tea. Kay nodded.

"What brings you to Pagford?"

"A relationship," said Kay. She took no pleasure saying it, even though she and Gavin were officially reconciled. She turned back to Colin.

"I don't quite understand the situation with regards to the Parish Council and the clinic."

"Oh, it owns the building," said Colin. "It's an old church. The lease is coming up for renewal."

"So that would be an easy way to force them out."

"Exactly. When did you say you'd spoken to Miles Mollison?" asked Colin, both hoping and dreading to hear that Miles had mentioned him.

"We had dinner, Friday before last," Kay explained, "Gavin and I -"

"Oh, you're Gavin's girlfriend!" interjected Tessa.

"Yes; and, anyway, the subject of the Fields came up -"

"It would," said Tessa.

"- and Miles mentioned Bellchapel, and I was quite - quite dismayed by the way he talked about the issues involved. I told him I'm dealing with a family at the moment," Kay remembered her indiscreet mention of the Weedons' names and proceeded carefully, "and if the mother is deprived of methadone, she'll almost certainly end up back on the game."

"That sounds like the Weedons," said Tessa, with a lowering sensation.

"I - yes, I am talking about the Weedons, actually," said Kay.

Tessa reached for another biscuit.

"I'm Krystal's guidance teacher. This must be the second time her mother's been through Bellchapel, is it?"

"Third," said Kay.

"We've known Krystal since she was five: she was in our son's class at primary school," Tessa said. "She's had an awful life, really."

"Absolutely," said Kay. "It's astounding she's as sweet as she is, actually."

"Oh, I agree," said Colin heartily.

Remembering Colin's absolute refusal to rescind Krystal's detention after the squawking incident in assembly, Tessa raised her eyebrows. Then she wondered, with a sick lurch in her stomach, what Colin would say if Sukhvinder was not lying or mistaken. But surely Sukhvinder was wrong. She was a shy, naive girl. Probably she had got the wrong end of the stick...misheard something...

"The point is, about the only thing that motivates Terri is the fear of losing her kids," said Kay. "She's back on track at the moment; her key worker at the clinic told me she senses a bit of a breakthrough in Terri's attitude. If Bellchapel closes, it all goes belly-up again, and God knows what'll happen to the family."

"This is all very useful," said Colin, nodding importantly, and starting to make notes on a clean page in his notebook. "Very useful indeed. Did you say you've got statistics on people going clean?"

Kay shuffled the printed pages, looking for the information. Tessa had the impression that Colin wanted to reclaim Kay's attention for himself. He had always been susceptible to good looks and a sympathetic manner.

Tessa munched another biscuit, still thinking about Krystal. Their recent guidance sessions had not been very satisfactory. Krystal had been standoffish. Today's had been no different. She had extracted a promise from Krystal that she would not pursue or harass Sukhvinder Jawanda again, but Krystal's demeanor suggested that Tessa had let her down, that trust was broken. Possibly Colin's detention was to blame. Tessa had thought that she and Krystal had forged a bond strong enough to withstand that, although it had never been quite like the one Krystal had with Barry.

(Tessa had been there, on the spot, the day that Barry had come into school with a rowing machine, looking for recruits to the crew he was trying to start. She had been summoned from the staff room to the gym, because the PE teacher was off sick, and the only supply teacher they could find at such short notice was male.

The fourth-year girls, in their shorts and Aertex tops, had been giggly when they had arrived in the gym to find Miss Jarvis absent, replaced by two strange men. Tessa had had to reprimand Krystal, Nikki and Leanne, who had pushed to the front of the class and were making lewd suggestive remarks about the supply teacher; he was a handsome young man with an unfortunate tendency to blush.

Barry, short, ginger-haired and bearded, was wearing a tracksuit. He had taken a morning off work to do this. Everybody thought his idea was strange and unrealistic: schools like Winterdown did not have rowing eights. Niamh and Siobhan had seemed half amused, half mortified by their dad's presence.

Barry explained what he was trying to do: put together crews. He had secured the use of the old boathouse down on the canal at Yarvil; it was a fabulous sport, and an opportunity to shine, for themselves, for their school. Tessa had positioned herself right next to Krystal and her friends to keep them in check; the worst of their giggling had subsided, but was not entirely quelled.

Barry demonstrated the rowing machine and asked for volunteers. Nobody stepped forward.

"Krystal Weedon," said Barry, pointing at her. "I've seen you dangling off the monkey bars down the park; that's proper upper body strength you've got there. Come here and give it a go."

Krystal was only too happy to step into the spotlight; she swaggered up to the machine and sat down on it. Even with Tessa glowering beside them, Nikki and Leanne had howled with laughter and the rest of the class joined in.

Barry showed Krystal what to do. The silent supply teacher had watched in professional alarm as Barry positioned her hands on the wooden handle.

She heaved on the handle, making a stupid face at Nikki and Leanne, and everyone laughed again.

"Look at that," Barry had said, beaming. "She's a natural."

Had Krystal really been a natural? Tessa did not know anything about rowing; she could not tell.

"Straighten your back," Barry told Krystal, "or you'll injure it. That's it. Pull...pull...look at that technique...have you done this before?"

Then Krystal really had straightened her back, and she really had done it properly. She stopped looking at Nikki and Leanne. She hit a rhythm.

"Excellent," said Barry. "Look at that...excellent. That's how you do it! Atta girl. And again. And again. And -"

"It 'urts!" shouted Krystal.

"I know it does. That's how you end up with arms like Jennifer Aniston, doing that," said Barry.

There had been a little ripple of laughter, but this time they laughed with him. What was it that Barry had had? He was always so present, so natural, so entirely without self-consciousness. Teenagers, Tessa knew, were riven with the fear of ridicule. Those who were without it, and God knew there were few enough of them in the adult world, had natural authority among the young; they ought to be forced to teach.

"And rest!" Barry said, and Krystal slumped, red in the face and rubbing her arms.

"You'll have to give up the fags, Krystal," said Barry, and he got a big laugh this time. "OK, who else wants a try?"

When Krystal rejoined her watching classmates, she was no longer laughing. She watched each new rower jealously, her eyes darting constantly to Barry's bearded face to see what he thought of them. When Carmen Lewis messed it up completely, Barry said, "Show 'em, Krystal," and her face lit up as she returned to the machine.

But at the end of the exhibition, when Barry asked those who were interested in trying out for the team to raise their hands, Krystal kept her arms folded. Tessa watched her shake her head, sneering, as Nikki muttered to her. Barry carefully noted down the names of the interested girls, then looked up.

"And you, Krystal Weedon," he said, pointing at her. "You're coming too. Don't you shake your head at me. I'll be very annoyed if I don't see you. That's natural talent you've got there. I don't like seeing natural talent wasted. Krys-tal," he said loudly, inscribing her name, "Wee-don."

Had Krystal thought about her natural talent as she showered at the end of the lesson? Had she carried the thought of her new aptitude around with her that day, like an unexpected Valentine? Tessa did not know; but to the amazement of all, except perhaps Barry, Krystal had turned up at tryouts.) Colin was nodding vigorously as Kay took him through relapse rates at Bellchapel.

"Parminder should see this," he said. "I'll make sure she gets a copy. Yes, yes, very useful indeed."

Feeling slightly sick, Tessa took a fourth biscuit.

X.

Parminder worked late on Monday evenings, and as Vikram was usually at the hospital, the three Jawanda children laid the table and cooked for themselves. Sometimes they squabbled; occasionally they had a laugh; but today, each was absorbed in their own particular thoughts, and the job was completed with unusual efficiency in near silence.

Sukhvinder had not told her brother or her sister that she had tried to truant, or about Krystal Weedon's threat to beat her up. The habit of secrecy was very strong in her these days. She was actively frightened of imparting confidences, because she feared that they might betray the world of oddness that lived inside her, the world that Fats Wall seemed able to penetrate with such terrifying ease. All the same, she knew that the events of the day could not be kept quiet indefinitely. Tessa had told her that she intended to telephone Parminder.

"I'm going to have to call your mum, Sukhvinder, it's what we always do, but I'm going to explain to her why you did it."

Sukhvinder had felt almost warm toward Tessa, even though she was Fats Wall's mother. Frightened though she was of her mother's reaction, a tiny little glow of hope had kindled inside her at the thought of Tessa interceding for her. Would the realization of Sukhvinder's desperation lead, at last, to some crack in her mother's implacable disapproval, her disappointment, her endless stone-faced criticism?

When the front door opened at last, she heard her mother speaking Punjabi.

"Oh, not the bloody farm again," groaned Jaswant, who had cocked an ear to the door.

The Jawandas owned a patch of ancestral land in the Punjab, which Parminder, the oldest, had inherited from their father in the absence of sons. The farm occupied a place in the family consciousness that Jaswant and Sukhvinder had sometimes discussed. To their slightly amused astonishment, a few of their older relatives seemed to live in the expectation that the whole family would move back there one day. Parminder's father had sent money back to the farm all his life. It was tenanted and worked by second cousins, who seemed surly and embittered. The farm caused regular arguments among her mother's family.

"Nani's gone off on one again," interpreted Jaswant, as Parminder's muffled voice penetrated the door.

Parminder had taught her first-born some Punjabi, and Jaz had picked up a lot more from their cousins. Sukhvinder's dyslexia had been too severe to enable her to learn two languages and the attempt had been abandoned.

"...Harpreet still wants to sell off that bit for the road..."

Sukhvinder heard Parminder kicking off her shoes. She wished that her mother had not been bothered about the farm tonight of all nights; it never put her into a good mood; and when Parminder pushed open the kitchen door and she saw her mother's tight mask-like face, her courage failed her completely.

Parminder acknowledged Jaswant and Rajpal with a slight wave of her hand, but she pointed at Sukhvinder and then toward a kitchen chair, indicating that she was to sit down and wait for the call to end.

Jaswant and Rajpal drifted back upstairs. Sukhvinder waited beneath the wall of photographs, in which her relative inadequacy was displayed for the world to see, pinned to her chair by her mother's silent command. On and on went the call, until at long last Parminder said good-bye and cut the connection.

When she turned to look at her daughter Sukhvinder knew, instantly, before a word was spoken, that she had been wrong to hope.

"So," said Parminder. "I had a call from Tessa while I was at work. I expect you know what it was about."

Sukhvinder nodded. Her mouth seemed to be full of cotton wool.

Parminder's rage crashed over her like a tidal wave, dragging Sukhvinder with it, so that she was unable to find her feet or right herself.

"Why? Why? Is this copying the London girl, again - are you trying to impress her? Jaz and Raj never behave like this, never - why do you? What's wrong with you? Are you proud of being lazy and sloppy? Do you think it's cool to act like a delinquent? How do you think I felt when Tessa told me? Called at work - I've never been so ashamed - I'm disgusted by you, do you hear me? Do we not give you enough? Do we not help you enough? What is wrong with you, Sukhvinder?"

In desperation, Sukhvinder tried to break through her mother's tirade, and mentioned the name Krystal Weedon - "Krystal Weedon!" shouted Parminder. "That stupid girl! Why are you paying attention to anything she says? Did you tell her I tried to keep her damn grandmother alive? Did you tell her that?"

"I - no -"

"If you're going to care about what the likes of Krystal Weedon says, there's no hope for you! Perhaps that's your natural level, is it, Sukhvinder? You want to play truant and work in a cafe and waste all your opportunities for education, because that's easier? Is that what being in a team with Krystal Weedon taught you - to sink to her level?"

Sukhvinder thought of Krystal and her gang, raring to go on the opposite curb, waiting for a break in the cars. What would it take to make her mother understand? An hour ago she had had the tiniest fantasy that she might confide in her mother, at last, about Fats Wall...

"Get out of my sight! Go! I'll speak to your father when he comes in - go!"