'And what about your education? One was always seeing pictures of him being dragged off by the police. That's all very admirable in youth no doubt. In middle age it begins to look embarrassing and ridiculous. I don't remember hearing about a daughter, or of a wife for that matter.'

'My mother died when I was born.'

'And who looked after you?'

'I was placed with foster parents for most of the time. Then when I was eleven, I won a scholarship to the Convent of the Holy Child. That was a mistake, not the scholarship but the choice of school. They muddled my name with another C. Gray, who was a Roman Catholic. I don't think father much liked it, but by the time he bothered to reply to the Education Officer's letter I was settled and they didn't like to move me. And I wanted to stay.'

He laughed. 'Redvers Gray with a convent-educated daughter! And they didn't succeed in converting you? That would have taught Papa, dedicated atheist, to answer his letters more promptly.'

'No, they didn't convert me. But then they didn't try. I didn't believe but I was happy in my invincible ignorance. It's rather an enviable state. And I liked the Convent. I suppose it was the first time I felt secure. Life wasn't messy any more.'

She had never before spoken so freely of her time at the Convent, she who was so slow to confide. She wondered whether this unusual frankness was possible only because she knew he must be dying. The thought seemed to her ignoble and she tried to put it from her. He said:

'You agree with Yeats. "How but in custom and in ceremony are innocence and beauty born?" I can see that it must have been reassuring, even one's sins neatly categorized into venial and mortal. Mortal sin. I like the expression even if I reject the dogma. It has a note of splendid finality. It dignifies wrongdoing, almost gives it form and substance. One can imagine oneself saying, "What have I done with my mortal sin? I must have put it down somewhere." One could carry it around, neatly packaged.'

Suddenly he stumbled. Cordelia put out her hand to steady him. His palm in hers was cold, the dry skin sliding over the bones. She saw that he looked very tired. The walk over the shingle had not, after all, been easy. She said:

'Let's sit for a while.'

There was a kind of grotto above them cut out of the cliff, with a mosaic terrace, now fractured and almost overgrown, and a curved marble seat. She helped pull him up the slope, watching as his feet found convenient clumps of grass and half hidden stone steps. The back of the seat, warmed by the sun, still struck a little chill through her thin shirt. They sat side by side, untouching, and lifted their faces to the sun. Above them hung a beech tree. Its trunk and boughs had the tender luminosity of a girl's arm, its leaves, just beginning to turn with their autumn gold, were veined marvels of reflected light. The air was very still and quiet, the silence pierced only by the occasional cry of a gull, while below them the sea hissed and withdrew in its everlasting restlessness.

After a few minutes, his eyes still closed he said:

'I suppose a mortal sin has to be something special, something more original and momentous than the expedients, the meannesses, the small delinquencies which make up everyday living for most of us?'

Cordelia said:

'It's a grievous offence against the law of God, which puts the soul at risk of eternal damnation. There has to be full knowledge and consent. It's all laid down. Any RC will explain it to you.'

He said:

'Something evil, if the word means anything to – you, if you believe in the existence of evil.'

Cordelia thought of the Convent chapel, altar candles flickering fitfully, her own bowed lace-covered head among the ranks of muttering conformists. 'And deliver us from evil.' For six years she had repeated these words at least twice a day long before she had ever asked herself what it was from which she craved deliverance. It had taken her first case, after Bernie's death, to teach her that. She could still recall, in sleeping and waking dreams, the horror which she had not in fact actually seen; a white elongated neck, a boy's disfigured face drooping from the noose, the twisting feet pointing to the floor. It was when she had finally stared into the face of his murderer that she had known about evil. She said:

'Yes, I believe in the existence of evil.'

'Then Clarissa once did something which you might dignify as evil. I don't know whether the good sisters would designate it as mortal sin. But there was knowledge and consent. And I've a feeling that, for Clarissa, it could prove mortal.'

She didn't speak. She wouldn't make it easy for him. But there was no self-control in her silence. She knew he would go on.

'It happened during the run of Macbeth in July 1980, Tolly -Miss Tolgarth – had had an illegitimate daughter four years earlier. There was no particular secret about it, most of us in Clarissa's set knew about Viccy. She was a sweet child. Grave-faced, rather silent, intelligent I think, as far as one can judge at that age. Sometimes, but only rarely, Tolly would bring her to the theatre, but most of the time she kept her private and working lives separate. She paid a child-minder to look after Viccy while she was working and it must have been convenient having mainly an evening job. She wouldn't take any money from the father. I think she was too possessive about Viccy to want to share even the cost of her food. Then two days before Clarissa opened in Macbeth it happened. Clarissa was at the theatre – there was a final rehearsal – and the minder was in charge of Viccy. The child had slipped out into the street and was playing with something in the gutter behind a parked lorry. It was the usual tragedy. The driver didn't see her and reversed. She was horribly injured. They rushed her to hospital and operated and she stood that very well. We thought that she'd make it. But on the first night of Macbeth the hospital telephoned at nine forty-five to say that there had been a relapse and to ask Tolly to go at once. Clarissa took the call. She had just come offstage for her costume change before the Third Act. She was appalled at the thought of losing her dresser at that moment. She took the message and put down the receiver. Then she told Tolly that the hospital wanted her to visit but that there was no hurry, after the performance would be all right. When Tolly wanted to ring back she wouldn't let her. And shortly after the performance ended, the hospital rang again to say that the child was dead.' 'How do you know this?'

'Because I took the trouble to get in touch with the hospital and ask about that first message. And because I was there in Clarissa's dressing-room when it came. You could say I was in something of a privileged position at the time. I wasn't with them when Clarissa finally told Tolly that she couldn't leave. I'd have stopped that; at least I hope I would. But I was there when the call came through. Then I went back to my seat. When the play ended and I went backstage to take Clarissa out to supper, Tolly was still there. And fifteen minutes later the hospital telephoned to say the child was dead.'

'And when you learned what had happened, was that when you stopped being a privileged person?'

'I should like to be able to tell you that it was. The truth is less flattering. She became my mistress for two reasons; firstly because I'd gained some reputation and Clarissa has always found power an aphrodisiac, and secondly because she imagined that a fuck a week would ensure her good notices. When she discovered her mistake – like most men I'm capable of betrayal but not of that particular betrayal – the privileges ceased. There are some favours it b unwise to pay for in advance.'

'Why are you telling me this?'

'Because I like you. Because I don't want to have this weekend spoilt by watching yet another person I respect being seduced by her charm. She has charm even if she hasn't bothered yet to exercise it on you. I don't want to see you behaving like all the others. I suspect that you may be possessed of that divine common sense which is impervious to the blandishments of egotism, whether sexual or otherwise, but who can be sure? So I am committing one more small act of betrayal to strengthen you against temptation.' 'Who was the child's father?'