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climbed up over her thighs in her sleep. He fingered the ends of her newly washed hair, a dark tangle that smelled of her DuBerry’s shampoo. He moved closer to the arc of her back, to her vertebrae, a Braille for his fingers. Yet to wake her would mean watching the new, painful memory of yesterday cross her face, and the prospect of it unsettled him as much as his longing impelled him.
    He kissed the nape of her neck, slightly salty now after the warmth of the night and the heaviness of her hair upon it. Beneath his palm, the skin on her elbow was rough; the hair on her arm, fine and soft. He ran his hand over the curve of her hip, fuller in the last few years. His testicles ached pleasurably. ‘Evvie.’
    ‘Hmm …’
    It was not entirely disingenuous. ‘Your arm. You’re sleeping on your arm again.’
    ‘It’s fine …’
    ‘Just shift a little …’ He drew her close, wrapping her feet in his. The muscles in his calves tightened. His heart drummed in his ear.
    Why, he asked himself, from the deep comfort of their bed, had he agreed to the Bank’s request? He hadn’t admitted to her that no one at Head Office had exerted pressure. On the contrary, they’d suggested he take a bit of time, mull it over, but he’d told them no – of course – someone had to be prepared. He was the branch manager. It simply made sense.
    Sometimes, privately, he felt unnerved by the depth of his feeling for her. It was at odds with the moderate person he usually was. He loved her too much – needed her too much – and perhaps he was never quite sure where one feeling ended and the other began.
    Had he agreed so readily to Seymour-Williams’s request simply to prove to himself that he could? Had he wanted somehow to caut-erize his heart?
    If so, he was making a kind of progress, not only in the guarantee he’d given at Head Office the day before, but also in the grim business of the pills. He’d cancelled the appointment twice, prevaricating, but, at last, he’d made the necessary arrangements with Dr Moore. He’d acted rationally. He hadn’t allowed any personal weakness to stop him from taking the difficult decision that other men had taken, discreetly, for their families.
    After the unconventional unhappiness of his childhood home – the secrets, the dissembling, the mournful visits to his mother in her room at Graylingwell – he had never aspired to anything more than a conventional family life. He’d wanted only an affectionate home, a shared sense of purpose, and the respect and love of his wife and son. The simple things in life were actually rather extraordinary – he’d never believed otherwise – and if he provided the life, the four walls of it, Evelyn animated their home. She was the thinker, the natural wit, the discerning eye. Next to her, he was a primitive; a blunt mass;straightforward, diligent, and clear in his judgements only because he lacked the patience for complication.
    He felt a surge of being, not only in their most intimate moments, but also in seemingly unremarkable exchanges: when his palm brushed hers in the space between them on the train; when she glanced at him over the top of her book; when her voice called from the top of the stairs. It was as if her hand or glance or the shape of his name on her lips released him into life.
    ‘My muse,’ he’d once called her, warmly if a little self-consciously, and she’d looked up, quizzical, surprised, but delighted, as if, in that evanescent moment, he’d seen through to the beating heart of her.
    He glanced behind him at the clock. Twenty minutes to seven. And again the thought, fast and sharp as the nick of a blade: what might the day bring?
    ‘Evvie?’ His thoughts were snapping in all directions. ‘’Morn-ing …’
    She turned towards him at last.
    ‘My tooth is better.’
    ‘That’s good …’ Wifely. Perfunctory. Only at the cusp of waking.
    He kissed a spot behind her ear, and she pressed her back and buttocks to him,