Kincaid mopped up the last bit of chip and sausage with his fork. Reluctant or not, he would go home and pick up the journals where he had left off. It was impossible now to leave the job unfinished, the life not followed to its conclusion. A feeling of urgency, almost of necessity, compelled him.

For months after Jasmine's settling in London, the journal entries reminded Kincaid of the daybooks kept by Victorian wives. Bought curtains for flat. Spent ten pounds to furnish kitchen with necessaries. Enough left to pay rates? Gaps appeared, then finally the entries began again, undated, sporadic and disconnected. Kincaid skimmed the pages, stopping occasionally to read an entry more carefully.

May's dead, just like Father now. Should feel something, I suppose, but I don't. Just blank. Did she know she was dying? Was she frightened, or did she stay starched as a preacher's drawers even at the end? Did she think of me? Was she sorry?

Could I have loved her, if I had tried harder?

Won't go back, not even for Theo.

This city seems to breed solitude in its slick, wet streets, in the cold that inhabits the stones. You could pass your whole life here, faceless, unrecognized, unacknowledged. I walk the same way to work every day, stop in the same shops, but I'm still a stranger, just "Miss."

The flat welcomes me home with its stink of old grease and I feed just enough coins into the electric fire to keep from freezing. Sometimes when I fall asleep I dream of India, dream I'm in my bed in the Mohur Street house, and I hear the early morning peddlers singing below my window.

I never dreamed May had so much money. Or that she would divide it equally between us. She did try to be fair, even though she didn't feel it. I have to give her that.

Why did she squirrel it away all those years? She lived like she couldn't buy the next day's milk, bitched about how she couldn't afford to keep me even when I was paying my share of the housekeeping, and all the time she had thousands of pounds sitting in the bank. The old cow.

A new flat, a groundfloor in Bayswater. Small, but clean, with sunlight through the windows, and the tiny patch of back garden has a plum tree just beginning to bloom. Look forward to coming home to a simple meal I've made myself, a glass of wine, everything just the way I want it. Safe. For the first time I feel a sliver of hope that life here might not always be so dreary, then there's the nagging reminder that May's money made it possible. I used it for the down-payment, but I won't spend more. Determined to live off my wages, not use the principal. Theo's already asking for loans against his balance, can't say no to him. He seems so lost.

The dreams started again. Woke up sweating and sick, didn't sleep the rest of the night. Wrote his mum again last week. No answer. There's no one else I can ask.

I shouldn't. I know I shouldn't. Shouldn't think, shouldn't remember, shouldn't write.

Sometimes it seems it all happened to someone else, it's so distant and distilled, then the dreams come.

A red-letter day today. My first day as junior assistant in the borough planning office. Pay's not much, but it's the first position with a chance for advancement.

This morning I got off the bus a stop early and walked through Holland Park. Gusts of wind scooped the leaves along the walks, people gripped their coats tighter and scurried with their heads down, but I felt exhilarated, as if I owned the park, owned the city, owned time even, and could stretch it as much as I wished.

Glorious as it was, at the same time I stood outside myself, aware of the experience, wondering if I could hold on to it, imprint it in my memory. Things fade so quickly. Already it's less intense, the edges are blurring, the joy bittersweet.

Everything he touches turns to disaster. A club this time, the latest everything, a sure success. Only it wasn't quite the right neighborhood, or there wasn't enough cash to keep it afloat through the critical period, or his partner raked the profit off the top. There's always something.

Am I to blame? If I hadn't left when I did… he wasn't strong enough to care for May when she got ill. She died in his arms. I didn't know. Theo said she looked so frightened. I couldn't have done anything for May, but I might have been some comfort to Theo.

Think Theo might be using drugs. What to say? Better or worse that I meddle? All his money's spent, trickled away like dust. Minimum wage work in the packing room of a Chelsea gallery-some friend took pity. He asks me for painting lessons. What can I do?

This is all there is. Told John to bugger off. Politely. Wasn't his fault. Nothing works. It's never the same.

Chapter Fourteen

Dr. James Gordon opened his inquest into the death of Jasmine Dent at nine o'clock on Wednesday morning. The courtroom trapped the previous night's chill, and smelled faintly of stale cigarettes. Kincaid felt thankful that in London coroners were usually doctors with law qualifications and most of them could be counted on to conduct an inquest with dispatch. County coroners, often small-town solicitors with more knowledge of local politics than medical jurisprudence, were sometimes tempted to grandstand. Kincaid had dealt with Dr. Gordon before and knew him to be fair, conscientious, and more to the point, intelligent. Gordon's blue eyes, as faded in color as his thinning, sandy hair, were sharp with interest. He presided at a scarred oak table in the small room, facing Kincaid, Gemma, Margaret Bellamy, and Felicity Howarth. All except Gemma had been called to give evidence, and no one else was in attendance.

They waited in silence as Gordon studied the papers spread in front of him. Kincaid glanced at the three women, thinking how clearly their postures reflected their personalities. Gemma looked both relaxed and alert, hands clasped loosely in her lap. In the gray light filtering through the courtroom's single window, her hair shone copper-bright against the dull olive of her jacket, and when she felt Kincaid's gaze, she looked up and smiled.

Margaret, although reasonably well-combed and groomed, twisted a quickly disintegrating tissue between her fingers. When she'd first walked into the room, Kincaid had noticed that her skirt hem dropped in places as if small boys had swung on it as it hung out to dry.

Felicity Howarth wore charcoal instead of navy, but was otherwise as neatly dressed as he'd first seen her the day of Jasmine's death. She sat finishing-school straight in the hard wooden chair, hands folded over her briefcase-like handbag. Her red-gold hair lacked some of its previous luster, however, and the lines around her eyes were more evident. Kincaid remembered Gemma telling him, when they had compared notes that morning, that Felicity was carrying a particularly heavy case-load just now.

"Mr. Kincaid."

Gordon's voice jerked Kincaid's attention back to the table. "Sir?"

"Mr. Kincaid, I understand it was you who requested the Coroner's Office to arrange an autopsy?"

"Yes, sir."

"Rather unusual circumstances, I should think, a senior officer with CID personally requesting an autopsy." Gordon's blue eyes searched Kincaid's face, but he continued before Kincaid could answer. "I assume you've sent the file to the Director of Public Prosecutions?"