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as if she is waiting for something to happen.
    ∗
    Rebecca returns from the hospital just as coffee is about to be served. She slips in beside her husband and squeezes his hand.
    ‘She’ll be fine,’ she says. ‘Nurse Gannet is just putting her to bed.’
    Lawrence stands up, raps on the table with his dessertspoon and proposes a toast.
    ‘To Mortimer!’ he says. ‘Health and happiness on his fiftieth birthday.’
    Muted echoes of ‘Mortimer’ and ‘Health and happiness’ resound throughout the room as the guests drain off whatever is left in their glasses. Then there is a loud and contented sigh, and somebody says:
    ‘Well! It has been a most pleasant evening.’
    All heads turn. Tabitha has spoken.
    ‘It’s so nice to get out and about. You’ve no idea. Only – ’ Tabitha frowns, and her face assumes a lost, downcast expression. ‘Only … I was just thinking how nice it would have been, if Godfrey could have been here tonight.’
    There is a long pause; broken eventually by Lawrence, who says, with an attempt at jovial sincerity: ‘Quite so. Quite so.’
    ‘He was so fond of Mortimer. Morty was most definitely his favourite brother. He told me so, many times. He much preferred Mortimer to Lawrence. He was quite decided about it.’ She frowns again, and looks around the table: ‘I wonder why?’
    Nobody answers. Nobody meets her eye.
    ‘I suppose it’s because … I suppose it’s because he knew – that Mortimer had no intention of killing him.’
    She watches her relatives’ faces, as if looking for confirmation. Their silence is horror-struck and absolute.
    Tabitha lays her napkin down on the table, pushes her chair back and rises painfully to her feet.
    ‘Well, it’s time I was getting to bed. Up Wood Hill to Blanket Fair, as Nanny used to say to me.’ She walks towards the dining-room door, and it becomes hard to tell whether she is still talking to the guests or merely to herself. ‘Up the long and winding stairs; up the stairs, to say my prayers.’ She turns, and there can be no doubt that her next question is addressed to her brother.
    ‘Do you still say your prayers, Lawrence?’
    He doesn’t answer.
    ‘I should say them tonight, if I were you.’
    ∗
    Drained of feeling, Rebecca lay back against the thick bank of pillows. Slowly she stretched her legs apart and massaged her thigh, easing the soreness. Beside her, his head weighing heavy upon her shoulder, Mortimer was already sinking into sleep. It had taken him almost forty minutes to reach his climax. It took longer every time; and although he was on the whole a gentle and considerate lover, Rebecca was beginning to find these marathon sessions something of a trial. Her back ached and her mouth was dry, but she did not reach out for the bedside glass of water in case she disturbed her husband.
    He started to mumble something drowsy and incoherent. She stroked his thinning hair.
    ‘… what I’d do without you … so lovely … make everything all right … bearable …’
    ‘There, there,’ she whispered. ‘We’ll be going home tomorrow. It’s over.’
    ‘… hate them all … what I’d do if you weren’t here to … make things better … feel like killing them sometimes … kill them all …’
    Rebecca hoped that Hilary was managing to get some sleep. Three of her fingers had been broken. She didn’t believe that story about it being an accident, didn’t believe it for a moment. There was nothing she wouldn’t put past Roddy, these days. Like those photographs she’d caught him with: which had turned out to be a present from Thomas, damn him …
    Half an hour later, at a quarter to two in the morning, Mortimer was snoring rhythmically and Rebecca was still wide awake. That was when she thought she heard the footsteps in the corridor, stealing past their bedroom door.
    Then the noises started. Crashes and banging and the unmistakable sounds of a fight. Two men fighting, using all their strength on each other,