“They didn’t run across you, he asked for you.”
“Why?”
“We hoped that you’d help us.”
“You were wrong.”
She loses control, a multilayered defence cracks open and just for an instant I glimpse the naked fear deep inside her.
“Are you sure that his suggestion won’t work?”
She waits for the answer with such frank anxiety that I start feeling like a doctor who has to tell a patient that his disease is incurable.
“No… but I’m not sure that it will, either.”
“But there is some hope?”
“There’s always hope.”
“So you will help. I’m sure you will! You’re not that kind of man …” She moves closer — so close that I can feel her breath. “I behaved very badly then … But, believe it or not, you were the only one I loved. And whatever I was doing all these years, I always wondered what you woul
