The Witch of Portobello Page 0,68

job you wanted. But if everything had happened as you planned that morning, in six months' time you would have died in a car accident. Forgetting your handbag yesterday changed your life.'

The girl began to weep.

'Does anyone else want to ask anything?'

Another hand went up. It was the director.

'Does he love me?'

So it was true. The story about the girl's mother had stirred up a whirlwind of emotions in the room.

'You're asking the wrong question. What you need to know is, are you in a position to give him the love he needs. And whatever happens or doesn't happen will be equally gratifying. Knowing that you are capable of love is enough. If it isn't him, it will be someone else. You've discovered a wellspring, simply allow it to flow and it will fill your world. Don't try to keep a safe distance so as to see what happens. Don't wait to be certain before you take a step. What you give, you will receive, although it might sometimes come from the place you least expect.'

Those words applied to me too. Then Athena or whoever she was turned to Andrea.

'You!'

My blood froze.

'You must be prepared to lose the universe you created.'

'What do you mean by universe?'

'What you think you already have. You've imprisoned your world, but you know that you must liberate it. I know you understand what I mean, even though you don't want to hear it.'

'I understand.'

I was sure they were talking about me. Was this all a set-up by Athena?

'It's finished,' she said. 'Bring the child to me.'

Viorel didn't want to go; he was frightened by his mother's transformation. But Andrea took him gently by the hand and led him to her.

Athena or Hagia Sofia, or Sherine, or whoever she was did just as she had done with me, and pressed the back of the boy's neck with her fingers.

'Don't be frightened by the things you see, my child. Don't try to push them away because they'll go away anyway. Enjoy the company of the angels while you can. You're frightened now, but you're not as frightened as you might be because you know there are lots of people in the room. You stopped laughing and dancing when you saw me embracing your mother and asking to speak through her mouth. But you know I wouldn't be doing this if she hadn't given me her permission. I've always appeared before in the form of light, and I still am that light, but today I decided to speak.'

The little boy put his arms around her.

'You can go now. Leave me alone with him.'

One by one, we left the apartment, leaving the mother with her child. In the taxi home, I tried to talk to Andrea, but she said that we could talk about anything but what had just happened.

I said nothing. My soul filled with sadness. Losing Andrea was very hard. On the other hand, I felt an immense peace. The evening's events had wrought changes in us all, and that meant I wouldn't need to go through the pain of sitting down with a woman I loved very much and telling her that I was in love with someone else.

In this case, I chose silence. I got home, turned on the TV, and Andrea went to have a bath. I closed my eyes and when I opened them, the room was full of light. It was morning, and I'd slept for ten hours. Beside me was a note, in which Andrea said that she hadn't wanted to wake me, that she'd gone straight to the theatre, but had left me some coffee. The note was a romantic one, decorated in lipstick and a small cut-out heart.

She had no intention of 'letting go of her universe'. She was going to fight. And my life would become a nightmare.

That evening, she phoned, and her voice betrayed no particular emotion. She told me that the elderly actor had gone to see his doctor, who had examined him and found that he had an enlarged prostate. The next step was a blood test, where they had detected a significantly raised level of a type of protein called PSA. They took a sample for a biopsy, but the clinical picture indicated that there was a high chance he had a malignant tumour.

'The doctor said he was lucky, because even if their worst fears were proved right, they can still operate and there's a ninety-nine per cent chance of a cure.'

Deidre O'Neill, known