What She Did on the Tuesday

Roy Tarrant arrived at the Herring House at half past six, in a car driven by a woman called Priti who had brought her own kettle, and Elias went down the hill to meet him and I did not, because I had a tree to tie off and because I am a coward about certain kinds of front door. By the time I came down, the Curlew room had a cardigan over the back of a chair in it and the whole building smelled of somebody else’s supper, and I went up the back stairs like a burglar.

My mother came and sat on the end of my bed at half past seven with a cup of tea she had made in Bea’s kitchen without asking anybody, which is the single most Susannah thing available.

“Right,” she said. “Boat.”

“Mum, I’ve had a day.”

“You’ve had a lovely day, I…