'Roza. What's the matter?'

'I don't know. I don't know you,' she said.

He faced her. 'But it's as if we do know each other. I'm right, aren't I? You know what I mean. Is it just because we've looked at each other, or, I don't know, laughed at the same joke? Is it because we're similar? What is it? And is something bothering you?'

Her eyes were dark, alarmed. 'There's nothing wrong with me.'

He turned back to the view, realising how outrageous it was to talk like this. 'No, well, of course. I'm sorry. I don't mean to be rude.'

She stood beside him, silently looking at the view.

He went on, despite himself, 'But why are we talking like this when we don't know each other?' He cleared his throat. 'How is it even possible?'

She said, 'I do know what you mean. But we can't do this. There's so much at stake.'

He said, 'But what are we doing?'

She glanced behind them. The crowd was facing inwards; no one was looking at them.

At the sight of her face he said, 'Roza. You look agonised. Everything's all right. Forget I said anything. It's the wine. I apologise. Everything's fine.'

She coughed. Was she wiping her eyes?

He said, 'Roza. I'm sorry if I've said too much. Someone will come out here any minute, your husband, for example.' He couldn't touch her. Even a calming hand on her arm could be seen and reported. But he wanted to put his arms around her. But he wanted to lead her to his car and drive her away, towards the black hills on the horizon; they would get out and look down on the carpet of city lights below, she would sit with her arms around her knees, and he would tell a joke and make her laugh, and then he would drive her to some motel on some road outside the city and smuggle her in under his overcoat ...

'Roza, put your hands on the rail.' He felt a mad laugh rise in him. His doctorly tone. She put her hand on his hand and he melted, all the blood rushing within him. Oh, the aching heart.

'There. Now, take a breath. Better?'

'Yes. Better.'

'People could be looking at us right now, so act natural. Move along the terrace.' Again the mirth, rising in him. But she took a sharp breath and sighed, and there was a hint of laughter about her too.

She shifted along, and he registered it with pain. It seemed unbearable that she should move away from him. He realised how far he'd gone in the last few minutes.

She said, not looking at him, 'Sorry.'

'Don't say sorry.'

She said, 'I need to talk to you. Could I ring you? A friend of mine's been your patient and gave me your cellphone number.' She'd got a grip on herself; now her movements were very deliberate. Taking a compact out of her pocket she dabbed at her eyes.

Need? Need to talk?

He said, 'Roza, ever since I first saw you, I've been completely ... I feel ... I can't understand it. It's as if ... I've seen someone I truly know. Or love. I mean, what a ridiculous thing.'

She turned, snapping the lid of the compact and looked at him, her eyes wide.

'Love,' she repeated. Her face was white, her eyes dark. She licked her dry lips and added in a high voice, 'You said the word "love"?'

He opened his mouth to deny, to make a joke. He said, 'I don't know.'

She laughed and shook her head, raised her chin, and there was that haughty, antagonistic look he remembered from the night of the fundraising dinner. Now she blinked hard and looked away, biting her nail.

'What a thing,' she said distantly. 'What a strange thing.'

She was turning away. He said, 'Roza.'

But she had to go inside, of course. He saw himself marching back into the room and announcing to Hallwright, 'I'm sorry but I'm leaving with your wife,' Hallwright protesting and Simon thrusting Karen forward. 'This one's keen. Take her.' His mouth twitched. How strange it was with him, always a malign little gnome in his brain, standing aside. Black laughter.

She'd said she would ring him, but would she? How could he bear it if the days went by and nothing happened? The agitation came back, a hot stab in his temple. He was trapped and felt, suddenly, as if he could turn distinctly nasty. It was an unfamiliar sensation. Women always said to Karen: 'Simon's lovely. He's such a nice guy.' Now he imagined himself bent over a patient, peering between her legs, madness and rage fizzing in every pore. The patient, startled, raising her head. 'Doctor, is everything ...?'

He laughed out loud. Winced. There was an ache in his chest, her name in his head. Roza.

A s.p.a.ce had been cleared at one side of the room. Graeme made a short speech, introducing 'our next prime minister'. Hallwright stepped up, to applause, a few awkward cheers.

'I'm not going to interrupt for too long, just to say, obviously, thanks to Trish and Graeme Ellison for opening their truly magnificent home to us. I know we're all excited and focused on the job ahead. This is an exciting time for us, obviously. We're going to heal this country. We're going to fix the mis ... mis ... mismanagement that the current government's inflicted on us as a whole over all these years, and I'd like you to raise your gla.s.ses ...'

Simon watched with his teeth bared, with the fancy that he could smell his own breath, something meaty and sour, straight from the lion house. His body tingled with adrenaline and s.e.xual energy. A waiter gave him another gla.s.s of wine; he was drinking too much. He looked at Karen and saw, as if from the outside, himself glaring out of the corner with his furious eyes and Karen turned away from him, innocent and unknowing, her face soft and pretty, her small hand clenched around the gla.s.s as she raised it and cheered, and some better self took over, aghast at the force that had invaded him and turned him into a man who was not nice, who smiled with mouth but not eyes.

He thought: this is all in the mind. I've wound myself into a state, and yet nothing has happened. For the second time that night the tension ran out of him. He had just had a tiny, brief storm in the brain. It was the booze, it was middle age. If a woman like that pays you attention, a woman so beautiful and mysterious and significant, of course you're going to get stirred up.

He pictured her as she had appeared out on the terrace. Those black curtains of rain, the storm on the horizon, her hands, elegantly shaped but bitten about the fingernails, the little finger crooked at the last joint, curving in towards the ring finger, her fingers, her hands. Simon finished his gla.s.s off in one long draught.

Karen came towards him. He looked at the brown curve of her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, swelling out of her dress. 'Let's get out of here. Let's go home,' he said.

'Are you drunk?'

'No,' he lied, running his arm down her side and around her waist, drawing her close. She drew away, irritated.

'Gosh Simon,' she said, running her hands through her hair.

He saw Roza in his mind's eye, standing at the rail of the terrace, and uneasiness welled up in him. He put his hand on Karen's shoulder, trying gently to urge her to come away, but it seemed a long time before he could make her go.

The Hallwrights left before them. Locked together, his arm around her waist, the future first couple turned and turned, saying their farewells. They reached Simon and Karen. Roza looked at him, his eyes travelled down to her hands, there was a blur of talk and he shook Hallwright's hand and rigged up a smile. He turned to Roza, wondering what his own expression conveyed. Her eyes were dark and huge in the thin face. Her manner was distant, kind. She was about to say something extra to Karen and he all but wrenched Karen away. They embraced Graeme and Trish, and inched out with the crowd, into the warm, black, howling night.

Karen drove and he slouched beside her, stroking her arm and knee, touching her until she pushed him off good-humouredly. They got home and went upstairs and she'd no sooner turned out the light than he was reaching for her, certain she would want him, because they needed each other, because he wanted her so badly, now, especially now.

She said, 'I'm tired. I've got a blistering headache. And you stink of booze.'

He kept trying, but it was no good. She got annoyed, and pushed him away, 'I hate it when you're drunk.'

He got up and stood at the window. The lashing trees out there. Wind raging, the sheets of rain.

'Come to bed, Simon. You're driving me crazy.'

He turned from the window. 'I'm driving you crazy. What about you? What about you, squashing yourself up against Hallwright all night?'

'What do you mean? What sort of rubbish is that?'

'You know what I mean.'

She sat up, turning on the light and scrabbling in her bedside drawer for a headache pill. 'No, I don't know what you mean.'

She threw the bedclothes this way and that, her b.r.e.a.s.t.s moving loosely inside her nightshirt. She gulped down the pill; he watched her throat move as she swallowed. Drawing up the covers, she turned with a flounce and settled down on her side, the quilt curving over her rounded thigh. Something bad had got into him; he turned off the light and climbed onto the bed, leaning over her.

'The Hallwrights. You're sycophantic with them. You're a star f.u.c.ker. You bounce around them like a kid.'

She sat up. 'Me? You've donated all that money, you're going to vote for him and all the time you carry on as if they're beneath you. You stir the pot, you make your sly little digs. What makes you so high and mighty? Who are you, Lord Muck? Why do you think you're better than David Hallwright? Trish thinks you're sweet and eccentric. But you're horrible about her too.' She spat out the words. 'Why don't you put your money where your mouth is?'

He laughed. It sounded bad, a snicker, in the dark. 'You mean, why don't I put my mouth where my money is.'

She reared up again. 'Shut up. I've got a hundred things to do tomorrow. Just shut up.' She flung out her hand and caught him on the injured arm, scratching him with her ruby ring. It was a small blow but it made his skin flare, and he slapped the side of his fist against the wall, to stop the hot itch as much as anything. A sickening pain jolted up his arm.

Karen stood up on the bed, pointing. 'Get out,' she commanded. 'I'll call the police. I will not have violence in this house.'

'Don't be melodramatic.'

'Get out.'

He got up and put on jeans, a shirt and shoes, and blundered out into the hall.

Elke was standing outside the bedroom door. She was in her underwear and a T-shirt and was leaning, one long thin leg drawn up, her foot resting against the wall. Her hair hung down over her eyes. Beside her the reflection of rain ran down the wall, a waterfall of silver and grey. He bowed his head, pressing her palm to his hot cheek, and heard her small, cool, ironic voice, 'I know what you're gunna say. All mums and dads have fights sometimes.'

'What are you doing out here? Go to bed LK.'

He squeezed her thin fingers, wanting to hug her, to crush her to his chest, but unable to. He was ashamed of the row.

He kissed her forehead and told her to go back to bed. 'Everything's fine,' he whispered.

But it wasn't. Turning away from Elke, crossing the dark hall, he stumbled against a flimsy side table. A vase rocked; he saw its pale glimmering shape and made a hopeless lunge for it, but managed only to swipe it with his fingertips before it hit the wall and broke.

With startling abruptness, Karen appeared on the landing and turned on the light. Her hair stood out from her head, her face was on fire.

'Smashing everything up. Get out. I'll call the police.'

She was angrier than he'd ever seen her. She actually had the phone in her hand. He reached for it but she drew herself up to her full height, ready to shout.

He retreated down the stairs and out of the house. The storm seemed to be squatting right over the house - thunder, lightning, the full hysterics. The rain was more or less horizontal. There was nothing else to do but get in the car.

He drove aimlessly at first, but the alcohol wore off and the strange urgency and excitement returned. Nerves, pressure, the ache in his chest drove him forward, onto the motorway, out through the rain-washed suburbs. He came off the motorway at Mangere and it didn't take long, a few wrong turns and retracings, before he was sitting in his car outside Mereana's house.

Ahead of him the street was a dark tunnel and there was a charged feeling in the air, a smell of electricity. Something moved in the trees at the edge of the park. He got out, locked his car and sprinted across the gra.s.s. There was no noise except the wind tearing at an iron fence.

She opened the door after he'd knocked for a while, her eye appearing against the chain, and she silently took in the sight of him leaning against the wall, muttering apologies, vague explanations. She undid the chain and opened the door. He said he'd had some trouble, asked if he could come in for a minute, apologised, started backing away.

'Actually it's a bad idea. Sorry. I don't know what I was thinking. I'll just go.'

But she said, 'It's all right. Lydon's gone. He's not coming back. There's no one here except me.' She said, 'Come and have a coffee. I wasn't even hardly asleep.'

He followed her in and stood about awkwardly, watching while she put the kettle on. She was wearing shorts and a T-shirt, and her hair was tied tightly back, making her green eyes look slanted. He noticed freckles across the bridge of her nose.

'How old are you?' he asked.

'Twenty-eight.'

'Do you like living alone?'

'I lived with a guy for six years. We broke up. I rented this house. I'm in between things.'

Together they looked into her aquarium and he told her about Marcus's aquarium, how it had depressed him finding one of the fish dead. His laugh sounded tight, fake.

She said, 'Yeah, well, they do that. Die.' She looked at him closely. 'What you done tonight anyway? Murdered your wife?'

'I've been at a party.'

'You look a bit ... freaked out.'

He made a nervous, helpless gesture with his hands. 'I had a strange, I don't know, conversation with a person - a woman. It made me agitated. I can't explain.' He smiled weakly. 'Then I had a row with my wife.'

He walked out of her bedroom, sat down on the couch and put his face in his hands.

Something cold touched his forehead. She was nudging him with a can of beer. 'You want it?' As soon as he took a sip he felt drunk again. His face was level with her thighs.

'What's gone wrong?' she said. 'You can tell me. We're friends.'

She sat down and he touched her arm and sighed. 'Yeah. Friends.'

Before she disappeared into her room she gave him a quilt to cover himself and he lay in the dark watching the water streaming down the window. The image came to him, of Elke standing against the reflection of falling water in the hall, Elke looking at him with her calm eyes. Before he'd really thought about it he'd got up and was standing at the bedroom door and there was Mereana, lying in the white glow from the aquarium, one hand behind her head. Wide awake, she looked at him steadily, and pulled back the covers, inviting him in. The fish hung in their square of light and he wondered what they saw, the room behind the gla.s.s, or only endless reflections of themselves? Then he was awkward on his knees on the bed and had his arms around her, kissing her, pulling off her clothes, but a tiny, prudent spark went off in his brain and he said, hearing the weirdly unfamiliar words that he would last have said a very long time ago, 'But I haven't got a condom.'

She said, 'Top drawer.'

And there he was, scrabbling among key rings and combs and tubes of Chapstick to find the small, sealed plastic square.

In a moment of pure innocence he thought, It's so good, how can it be bad? But what he felt mostly was - how could he describe it? - relief that the pain and pressure were easing, but relief also that he couldn't - not during, not afterwards lying in the dark - see Mereana's eyes, couldn't visualise her face.

eight.

Roza and David lay in bed watching it: the money world in meltdown. David had been up and down all night making calls.

Roza wriggled nearer to him and asked, 'Are we ruined, darling?'

They looked at a picture of a stock exchange trader with his head in his hands.