‘Apparently you need someone to look at your head,’ said the doctor.

‘I’m fine.’

‘Someone’s on their way down from Neurology to assess you.’

Frieda looked at her watch. ‘I’m leaving in five minutes,’ she said.

The doctor’s eyes widened in dismay. ‘You can’t,’ she said.

‘You’ll find that I can.’

‘I’ll need to check.’ The young doctor rushed back out through the curtain. Frieda sat up on the bed. She held up her hands and looked at them. She wiggled the fingers. It all seemed fine. Time to go. The curtain was pushed aside and a man stepped inside. He was dressed in jeans and white tennis shoes and a short-sleeved checked shirt. He had curly dark hair and he was unshaven.

‘This cubicle’s taken,’ said Frieda.

With a frown, the man picked up the clipboard that was on a hook at the end of the bed. ‘I’m meant to have a look at you.’ He put the clipboard down and saw Frieda properly for the first time.

‘Goodness,’ he said.

‘It’s not mine,’ Frieda said.

‘Yes, but still. What happened?’

‘I was attacked.’

‘Looks like you fought back.’

‘I had to.’

‘And you hit something big.’

‘The subclavian artery.’

‘Are they dead?’

‘I managed to stem the bleeding.’

‘Not all of it. From what –’ And then he stopped and looked at Frieda with a new interest. ‘I know you,’ he said.

‘Yes.’

‘Don’t tell me.’

‘All right.’

A slow smile spread across his face. ‘You need to take your shoes off and your socks.’

Frieda slipped them off.

‘Can you flex your toes?’ he said. She did so. ‘That’s fine. Do you know what day it is?’

‘Friday.’

‘Splendid.’

‘It began on a Friday and it ended on one.’

‘You’ve lost me there.’

‘Never mind.’

‘You came to my flat and took me to see a woman with a really interesting psychological condition.’

‘That’s right.’

‘Weren’t you working with the police?’

‘I was.’

‘How did that work out for you?’

‘It was mixed.’

‘Did you find out who did it?’

‘Yes. But I ended up in hospital that time as well. And it wasn’t just someone else’s blood.’

He took a penlight from his pocket. ‘Look up at the corner.’ He aimed the light at one eye and then the other. ‘I’m Andrew Berryman.’

‘I remember,’ said Frieda. ‘You were playing the piano. As an experiment into the ten-thousand-hours theory, where many hours each day of hard work trump innate ability.’

‘The experiment didn’t work,’ he said. ‘I gave up.’

‘Neurological abnormalities. That was your field, wasn’t it?’

‘It still is.’

‘I thought of getting in touch with you once or twice. For your professional opinion.’

He put his penlight back in his pocket. ‘You should have done,’ he said. ‘And you’re fine. Except …’ He rubbed the side of his face. ‘You say that the last time we met, it ended up with you in hospital. And now you’re here again. I don’t like blood. That’s why I went into neurology.’

‘I didn’t want this to happen.’

‘You’re a therapist, aren’t you?’

‘That’s right.’

‘Don’t therapists believe that everything happens for a reason?’

‘No, they don’t.’

My mistake.’

‘So, have you finished?’

‘You’re probably in shock, after what you’ve gone through. So you should be kept under observation.’

Frieda stood up. ‘No. I’m done here.’

‘Are you planning on just leaving?’

‘That’s right. I only live a few minutes from here.’

‘You can’t walk the streets looking like that.’

‘I’ll be fine.’

Berryman shook his head disapprovingly. ‘I’ll get you a lab coat. And I’ll walk you back.’

‘I don’t need that.’

‘I’ll walk you back, which will allow me to assess your psychological state. You can agree to that or I’ll have you forcibly restrained.’

‘You can’t do that.’

‘You’re covered in blood. You’ve been brought by ambulance from a crime scene. You wanna bet?’

‘All right,’ said Frieda. ‘Anything. So long as I can leave.’

32

Josef had kept the plants watered and fed the cat, but a fine layer of dust lay over everything and there was a slightly musty smell in the rooms, whose windows had remained closed through the hot summer weeks of Frieda’s absence.

She worked slowly and methodically through the morning, vacuuming, wiping surfaces, pulling weeds from the pots on her patio. She took all of the clothes that she had worn as Carla to the charity shop a few streets away and put out clean towels. The fridge was empty, apart from a jar of olive paste and eggs long past their sell-by date that she dropped into the bin. She went to the shops and bought herself enough for the next few days: milk, bread and butter, some bags of salad and Sicilian tomatoes, salty blue cheese, smoked salmon that she thought she would eat that evening, raspberries and a little carton of cream. She let herself imagine the evening ahead of her, alone in her clean and orderly house, with the cat at her feet.

Then she went up into her study at the top of the house and wrote emails to her patients, saying that she was ready to start work again next week, and if they wanted to return they should let her know. Before she had sent them all an answer came back from Joe Franklin, simply saying: ‘Yes!’ She wrote his name in her diary on the days she had always seen him.

At three o’clock that afternoon she went out and took the Underground from Warren Street to Highbury and Islington, then walked the remainder of the way. She walked more slowly than usual, aware that she was putting off the moment when she would knock at Sasha’s door.

The door swung open and Reuben was standing in front of her, holding out his arms in welcome. She stepped into his embrace and he hugged her and ruffled her short hair, told her what she knew already – that she was back at last. Then there were quick light footsteps and Ethan flew into view. He was wearing red shorts and a blue T-shirt and holding an ice cream that was melting over his hand as he ran.

‘Frieda!’ he yelled. ‘I’m going to make a frog box with Josef and Marty.’

‘A frog box?’

‘For frogs to be in.’ Some ice cream plopped to the floor. He took a violent lick at the cone.

‘Who’s Marty?’

‘He works with Josef,’ said Reuben. ‘Ethan’s taken a shine to him.’

‘I see. Where is Josef?’

‘Here.’ And there he was, coming down the stairs. He stopped in front of her and, for a moment, couldn’t seem to find the words. His brown eyes gazed at her. ‘And glad,’ he said. ‘Very glad for this sight.’

‘Thank you, Josef.’ Frieda took one of his large calloused hands between hers and pressed it. ‘How’s Sasha?’

Josef glanced at Ethan, whose face was now covered with ice cream, then back at Frieda. He shook his head from side to side. ‘In bed,’ he said.

‘Mummy’s ill,’ said Ethan, brightly. ‘But only a little ill.’

Who was going to tell him about Frank? wondered Frieda, and when and how? It was going to be hard. ‘I’ll go and see her.’

She mounted the stairs. At the door to Sasha’s room she paused, listening. She could hear faint rasping sounds, like a muffled saw. Sasha was weeping. Reuben had told her on the phone that Sasha had been crying steadily since she had found out the truth. ‘Almost like a machine made for crying,’ he’d said. ‘With no variation, no diminution or increase.’

Frieda pushed the door and entered. The curtains were closed against the bright day; Sasha lay under her covers, a humped shape from which came the sound of sobbing that was like a distressed, strangulated breathing. In and out, in and out.