Portobello Page 0,95

the concrete mixer was expertly reversed through a narrow gap and the crowd began to dissolve.

Lance's nan, deprived of entertainment, sighed resignedly and turned to him. 'So how's the world treating you, lovely?'

'I'm good,' said Lance with a hopeful glance at Dave.

Dave refilled their glasses. He shook the last of the crisp crumbs into the palm of his hand, dropped the bag over the railing and watched it float gently down into the street below. Then he turned to Lance and smiled in an avuncular sort of way. 'You'll be wanting to know what them bits and bobs fetched.'

'Rings and things and buttons and bows,' said his nan unexpectedly.

'The market's very dodgy.' Dave might have been talking about the current state of the euro. 'There's like a world recession. Still, I've done my best for you.' He pulled out of his pocket two dirty and crumpled notes, a twenty and a ten. The twenty had a rent in it mended with Sellotape.

Deeply disappointed, Lance stared. 'That all you got?'

'Didn't I say the market's dodgy? After I took my ten per cent that's the best I could do. It's not like they was diamonds.'

Diamonds were exactly what Lance believed they were. In those few moments, sitting on his nan's balcony, the light fast fading and the air taking on an autumnal cooling, a metamorphosis came over him. Uncle Gib, in one of his biblical phrases, would have said that the scales fell from his eyes. His father might have said that he began to grow up. He saw that the trust he habitually had in people, in almost anyone, was misplaced. No one was going to do anything much for him. They never had and they never would. He was out on his own.

When his nan said the nights were drawing in and it was time for them all to go down the Good King Billy, he got up and walked through the doorway into the living room. But instead of waiting to accompany them meekly to the pub – where he would have been expected to spend a good half of his thirty pounds – he said, not 'Cheers', but like someone three times his age, 'Goodnight,' failing to add, as he normally would have done, the obligatory 'See you later'. They were silent, apparently aware that all was not well. He let himself out, went quickly down the stairs and out into the street, turning in the opposite direction to the one that led to the pub.

Of the hundred people who had been invited, eighty-three had accepted their invitations. The hotel on the river, licensed for wedding ceremonies, was booked, the lunch menu scrutinised (and frequently subjected to alterations) by Eugene, the flowers lavishly ordered, the cars organised and, of course, every detail of departure for the honeymoon and the honeymoon itself arranged in advance. Ella had collected her wedding dress and her 'going-away' suit. Her own two suitcases were packed, as was Eugene's.

'You want me to come over in case anyone comes back here?' said Carli. 'I mean, serve tea or drinks or whatever?' She was plainly anxious to feast her eyes on the guests and get a sight of Ella in her wedding dress.

'No one will come back here, Carli. Not even ourselves. We shall go straight from the hotel on our honeymoon.' Ella could see no particular reason to tell Carli where that honeymoon destination was or when they would be leaving from Heathrow. 'While we're away perhaps you'd like to check-up on your – er, sweets you've left in the drawers. There seem to be rather a lot of them, even some in one of the bathrooms.'

The woman stared. 'My what?'

Her tone was belligerent. Ella felt she had herself perhaps been too abrupt. 'I'm sorry, Carli. There's absolutely no reason why you shouldn't keep your sweets in this house. Forget it.'

'I never eat sweets. Never. You're mixing me up with someone else.'

Ella started to say there was no one else but she stopped herself. Carli had been vacuum-cleaning their bedroom and she left her to it, going back into the guest bathroom. The brown-and-orange pack of Chocorange – for that, she saw, was its name – was still there. Down in the drawing room, Eugene had put all her books away as he had promised, neatly, precisely, according to author and each one alphabetically. She had been kneeling there, in front of the row of Forsters, when he had come in and shouted at, as