I observed myself in the mirror. ‘That’s lucky.’

While he measured and prodded, I gazed awkwardly at the knots of cream satin ribbon that tethered the curtains. Mazarine and the youth conferred and pushed me this way and that, as if I was weightless.

A full-length mirror reconfirmed my thinness but it did not please me as it might have done. Who was this person in the mirror, without presence, without bearing?

‘Pay attention, Rose, and try this on.’ Mazarine handed me the first of many garments.

I obeyed and felt my flesh settle into lace and wire.

‘There,’ she said, a magician happy with her work. ‘Good.’

For anyone’s information, the healing quotient of getting without difficulty into a black lace body embroidered with tiny butterflies is high.

‘How are the finances?’ Mazarine inquired, a little late in the day, as we carried expensive-looking bags out of the boutique.

‘I have six months’ salary. Or I did until an hour ago.’ Mazarine looked smug. ‘This is an investment in your future.’

‘I’m not looking for a husband replacement.’

‘Who said that you were?’

Our next stop was Zou Zou, whose proprietor, a slender, chic woman, appeared to be on the best of terms with Mazarine. The two women conferred fast and emphatically with many a gesture in my direction, and I got the impression that they considered I did not possess a rag worthy to sit on my back. They hustled me into a cubicle and practically ripped off my clothes.

Hands and voices fussed and chattered and pinned on alterations.

I found myself in a sleeveless linen dress cut in the oh-so-French manner. But, dear me, the buttons were not, apparently, in sympathy with my bustline. I confess to being enchanted with this notion. So much in life is wasted or lost – supermarket packaging, emotion, methane gas from cows, years of building up a marriage – but this particular art of placement was the one area in which nothing was overlooked. Buttons sympathetic to the precise line of nipples were there to help salve the wounds of time and love that had gaped open and bloody after one short sentence had been uttered: I’ve found someone else.

Chapter Fifteen

The Rose in the mirror had undergone a metamorphosis worked by Mazarine’s intervention. Breast, waist and leg were cradled by lace, wire, linen and silk: no longer was I the neutral, unremarked shadow I imagined I had become – the shadow who slipped through streets alongside hundreds of other neutral, unremarked women, whose hearts beat, as mine did, with rage that they had arrived at this point. More than that, I had stepped over fear and habit and kicked them away. That’s why I looked different.

‘Hallo, Rose,’ I said softly.

The figure in the mirror moved, and the delicate, expensive materials cradled curves, accentuated the swoop of bone under the flesh. No, certainly not a ghost. Certainly not insubstantial. Mazarine gave me a little pat and I was filled with gratitude to the friend who countered whatever life threw at her with elegant theories and shopping. ‘Hurry up,’ she said, ‘we’ll be late for the salon de beauté.’

Two hours later, smarting from the toughest depilation I had ever endured and glowing after a mud pack culled from a prehistoric spring, I sat down in a pink silk chair and presented my hands and feet for the final lap.

A girl sat on a stool in front of me and a pair of thin white hands kidnapped mine. The rest of her was thin, too, and she went to work abstractedly in a way that suggested that, if her body was present, her mind ranged elsewhere. Eventually she spoke. ‘Madame has not been taking care of her nails.’

This was indisputable.

She examined my right hand. ‘If you cultivate the habit, you can train them.’

The grit in the oyster, I sat in the luxurious room while layers of cream, powder and varnish were applied to turn me into a pearl. The girl proceeded to tackle a cuticle, which certainly had not acquired the habit, and the discomfort was such that I decided to defend myself. ‘But I will be acquiring the habit,’ I said. ‘Definitely.’

As a philosophy it had limitations, but it would do.

Because I was curious, Mazarine took me to see the house in the fashionable sixteenth and, in an area that grew beautiful houses like mushrooms, it was beautiful. Built of dazzling white stone, many-windowed, it exuded poise, certainty and memories of a civilized history.

‘About 1730,’ Mazarine whispered, as we peered, like children, through the wrought-iron gates into the courtyard.

‘Why are we whispering?’

‘I don’t know’ Mazarine adjusted her voice to normal. ‘It belonged at one time to the Duc de Sully. We won’t go in but it’s kept in immaculate order. Not a thing out of place. White muslin, bleached wood, that sort of thing. Huge beds. The housekeeper is a fiend at her job and lectured me on how get to rid of silverfish.’

A couple of the windows had been opened, and there was a flutter of white muslin. ‘Not a home, then,’ I said. No shelter for a sobbing child, exhausted adolescent, or hurt adult, even. Just a place where desire was kept artificially in a state of permanent expectation.

‘Let’s go. I hate it.’ Mazarine was stiff with tension.

A girl went through the gate as we were leaving, tap-tapping on high, spindle heels. She was slender, dark and expensive-looking. She paused to adjust the gold chain that anchored her handbag to her shoulder, caught my gaze and sent me a small, hard smile.

A flower-seller was positioned by the entrance to the Metro, with a mass of starved-looking lilies and roses in buckets. The lily petals had retracted like claws and the roses looked bruised. Beside them was another bucket, stuffed with harsh orange gerberas. Ugly but alive. On an impulse I bought a bunch.

Back in her apartment, Mazarine arranged the gerberas in a vase. The corners of her lips were turned down. ‘Xavier should have told me.’ The mouth became more tragic.

I arrived back at Lakey Street on a warm Sunday afternoon and the post was splattered all over the floor. I picked it up and sorted it into piles. Bills, circulars, a postcard from Poppy, another from Sam. Both informed me that they were well and happy, and I was not to worry.

Warmed by my children, I moved round the house opening windows, letting in fresh air, and phoned Ianthe, who was coming over for supper. Next I checked up on Mr Sears.

‘Didn’t notice you’d gone,’ he said, as I placed in his lap the box of chocolates I had brought for him.

‘Glad you’ve missed me.’

‘I’ve been counting my blessings. It takes me all day.’

I laughed. ‘Actually, I’ve been counting mine.’

Back home, I made a macaroni cheese and laid the table in the kitchen. My mother had never lost her taste for good, heavy, plain food.

On the dot, Ianthe arrived looking her usual neat self in a soft blue cardigan and flowered cotton dress with a full skirt, but a little pale. She noted the laid table. ‘Can’t we have supper in the garden? It’s a shame to be inside.’

I did not attempt to explain my neglect of the garden. I pulled out a tray and piled on to it the cutlery and china.

Ianthe watched me. ‘Any new developments?’

‘Not as far as I’m aware.’

She sighed, the blocked, irritable sound of a parent pinned against a brick wall. ‘I don’t know what your father would have thought.’

‘Dad was very practical, Mum. I’m sure he would have understood. I feel… well, it’s gone too far for retrieval. I have to face the fact that Nathan has decided to go. I can’t undo that. I know he wouldn’t have done anything so final unless he meant it, and it’s not as simple as saying forgive and forget.’

‘Yes, it is, if you decide it is.’

‘Mum, believe me…’ Ianthe’s stricken expression forced me to change tack. ‘Since we’re on the subject, you’ve never really explained why you didn’t get married again.’

‘I didn’t find the right person.’

It was my turn to sigh. ‘Nonsense. There was Jimmy Beestwick. He hung around for years. Or the nice Neil… so why? You would have been much more comfortable. Less lonely. All that.’ Ianthe’s gaze fell away. ‘Go on, tell me.’

The admission was slow in coming. ‘Your dad was everything. I wasn’t sure I could do it twice. Have the luck, I mean.’

‘So it’s not that simple. It’s magic, witchery and good timing.’

Ianthe picked up the tray. ‘Sometimes, Rose, I think you’re being deliberately stupid. It’s common sense and being unselfish. But I’m not sure anyone sees it like that any more.’

‘You’re contradicting yourself, Mum. Admit.’

Defeated, she shrugged. ‘I can’t explain.’

This year I had not exhumed the chairs from the garden shed, so I fetched a couple from the kitchen. Ianthe sat down heavily in hers.

Macaroni cheese is comforting, and we ate in silence. Afterwards, Ianthe said, ‘Your father was a wonderfully secure person to live with, and he made people around him feel secure. That’s why I could never get over the will business. It was so unlike him.’

To my horror, her eyes filled with tears. ‘Oh, Mum, don’t. Please don’t.’

Ianthe extracted a neatly ironed handkerchief from her cardigan sleeve and pressed it to her eyes. ‘It’s nothing… I’m all right… Actually, there is something. It’s just that I have to have some tests and I haven’t been sleeping that well.’ Her pause was more alarming than anything she said. ‘Nothing serious, you know’

I pulled my chair closer to hers. ‘No, I don’t know, Mum. You’d better tell me.’

Ianthe gave the irritating laugh she reserved for social occasions when she felt out of depth. ‘Just a lump. The doctor says it’s more likely than not to be a cyst.’ She tapped her chest.