She turns away and she's blushing crimson.

'I'd better go,' she says.

She goes out.

Welkin looks at me and shrugs.

I go up to my room, close the curtains and sit at the table. I take off my trousers and I've thoughts of holding Bridget, without speaking, grabbing hold of her as she walks by, and for a minute we're at it against the banister.

But it's no good. I keep seeing Welkin's dead eyes, the way he looked right at me while he held her. He's downstairs, but it's just the same as if he were standing inside my room, laughing without opening his mouth, then saying some c.o.c.ksure thing in French.

The front door slams.

I open the curtains an inch and watch him leave, walk towards the bus-stop.

I dress, wash my hands, wait a few minutes, then go down.

Bridget's sitting on the settee, her stockinged feet up on a pouf. The TV's on, the sound turned down low.

'h.e.l.lo, Patrick.'

'h.e.l.lo.'

She takes her feet off the pouf, slides them back into her flat shoes. She was wearing heels when Welkin hugged her. 'I thought you were busy,' I say.

'I'm just taking a little break,' she says. 'There's a picture I really want to see starting in a few minutes.'

She looks back to the TV.

'Mind if I join you?'

'Not at all.'

'I think I'll just read the newspaper for a while,' I say.

Although it's still light out, she's drawn the curtains. The air's stuffy and there's the smell of sweat from her feet.

I turn on the lamp and sit in the armchair nearest the window.

The TV's tuned to a game show. She turns up the volume.

'I like watching people win things,' she says. 'I can always tell I'm in low spirits if I can't be happy for somebody winning something.'

'I know what you mean,' I say.

The contestant's a middle-aged man with a stout belly. He sits on a backless stool and his feet don't reach the bottom rung. The prize is a fridge and it spins to the sound of tinny music on a slow carousel in the middle of the studio floor. He doesn't win the fridge and I don't feel sorry for him.

'What a pity,' I say.

'It was only a fridge,' she says.

She stares at the screen.

I wish she'd talk more.

There's a blowfly and it's buzzing behind her head and it circles her face, goes after the sweet soft skin on her cheeks, but she isn't bothered. It's just as though she doesn't notice.

I get up and go after the fly with a newspaper, hit the lampshade.

'Leave it,' she says. 'It's not bothering me.'

I sit.

'I can't stand flies,' I say. 'I can't be in the same room with them. They take up so much... ' I fold the newspaper. 'What?' she says.

'They take up so much of everything, they take the air out of the room, with their noise and the beating of their fat bodies all over the walls and sucking on your skin.'

She goes on looking at the TV.

'They don't bother me,' she says. 'And they only tickle. They don't suck.'

She won't look at me.

I move forward in the armchair, so I'm closer to her.

'Who knows what flies are doing,' I say, 'when they land on your face or hands and twitch their legs and make their wings vibrate. They're probably sucking. For all we know, that's exactly what they're doing.'

She ignores me, watches the commercial break.

Somebody's yelling at us about soap powder, shouting that it makes whites whiter than white.

At last, she turns to face me.

'Patrick. If I didn't know better I'd say you've been drinking.'

'I haven't.'

'You're in a strange mood.'

You all want me to talk more, and when I do this is what happens. I can't keep up with life.

'It's only that I don't like insects, especially flies. I wouldn't take it personally.'

She laughs, but it's not a nice sound. It's nervous and brittle. 'I didn't take it personally,' she says. 'I only thought it was a bit of an outburst. That's all.'

'There must be things that get on your goat,' I say.

'I suppose.'

'Give me an example.'

I know she likes being asked questions. Everybody does.

Sure enough, she looks at me, smiles. 'Let me think.'

I let her think, stop myself filling in the silence by counting the k.n.o.bs on the TV.

'Okay,' she says. 'I suppose parents being cruel to their children, you know, when they hit them and scream at them in the street and your blood boils just knowing that right in front of you a life's on its way to being destroyed, then the next generation and the one after that...'

'I know what you mean,' I say.

She's ranted just like me and she's got to see now that we're not so different.

'Is there anything else?' I say.

She looks back at the TV. 'No,' she says.

'Nothing?'

'I think I'd like to watch this,' she says. 'And just have a quiet rest. Is that all right?'

Her voice's gone flat and cold.

'Of course,' I say.

I stand up.

She doesn't look at me.

'Enjoy the picture,' I say.

'Okay, Patrick,' she says. 'I will.'

There's no point staying if she's not in the mood and there's no point taking it to heart. She's probably tired from making the dinner or she's remembered her dead husband and she'll be wanting some distance between us now because of her embarra.s.sment with Welkin.

I'll wait.

I go up to my room and undress and get into bed with the champagne and drink it straight from the bottle.

9.

I wake at 5 a.m. I'm in a strange mood and my hand shakes when I take a shave. I've been thinking about Sarah and the first night we had s.e.x, how she slept behind me with her hand on my chest and how I thought we'd always sleep that way. She said she liked it.

I don't go down for breakfast.

I want a walk in the fresh air to clear my head and I want to see Georgia and find out if she's been seeing Welkin.

It's a bright, warm morning and I walk the long way, cross the esplanade, climb over the low wall marking the edge of the promenade, go down to the sand.

My mood's good by the time I reach the cafe and even better when I see Georgia.

She's clearing a table, her back to me, and I watch her a while before I say good morning.

I get to thinking that I always liked Sarah best in the moment before I got to her, before she came to my front door, before she came to meet me after work. I always liked her more in the thinking of her. But it's not so with Georgia. I like her just as much when I see her.

Soon as she sees me, she turns and smiles.

'h.e.l.lo,' I say.

'h.e.l.lo. What've you got there?'

'My toolkit.'

Her cheeks are flushed and her eyes are as blue as the blouse she's wearing, like the colour in brochures showing swimming pools in fancy resorts.

'Have you started work?'

'Yesterday.'

There are five other customers. Three workmen wearing overalls who sit together by the window and two women in their forties in the back booth.

A man in the kitchen calls, 'Order!'

I didn't know she worked here with a man. I'd like to get a look at him.

'I think there's a man at the boarding house who knows you,' I say.

'Who?'

'His name's Ian.'

She says nothing, only looks at me.

'Do you know him?'

'I might do. If he comes in here, then I probably do.'

'He's tall and he's got blond hair.'

'I've got to get back to the furnace,' she says. 'Take a seat.'