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to my mother, or go to school.
    When the doctor had gone, leaving Mrs Deverell as mystified as ever, but relieved, Angel appeared to fall asleep again and the rash on her arms grew paler. Mrs Deverell went down to the shop, where she was sure that Eddie was helping himself to sugar-wafers.
    Angel wondered how she could creep from bed and fetch some food, but the peril of being discovered less ill than she had pretended, kept her lying there. She dozed, then woke and scratched the rash to make it worse, worried that it might vanish altogether. Mrs Deverell found time to steam a fillet of plaice, and when she brought it Angel sighed ungratefully and stared at the tray as if the very thought of eating defeated her. She was waiting for her mother to go. She wanted to be alone while she ate, and not only because she must hide her appetite. In a strange way, almost as if she were in love with food and drew comfort from it, she loved solitude while she ate. Talking at mealtimes irritated her.
    â€œDon’t you fancy it, then?” her mother asked. They were still wary with one another, but Angel’s illness made conversation possible.
    â€œI’ll try.”
    The food was getting cold and Angel’s exasperation made her hands tremble as she took up the knife and fork.
    â€œWell, do your best. I must get back downstairs.” Mrs Deverell drank a cup of Bovril behind the counter and whenever she was hungry took a biscuit from one of the tins, or a handful of sultanas.
    Angel ate as slowly as she could, every morsel of fish and the two thin slices of bread and butter and drank some milk. When her mother came back the tray was on the floor and the plate was as clean as if it had been polished.
    â€œSo you finished it all? That’s good.”
    â€œI’m afraid the cat did.”
    â€œThe cat?”
    â€œI couldn’t manage it after all and the tray was heavy on my legs, so I put it on the floor and the cat ate it. I had a little.”
    â€œBut I shut the cat out.”
    â€œYou shut the cat in .”
    â€œWell, where is he now, then?”
    â€œI got out of bed and put him outside.”
    â€œOh, how vexatious! And the price the fish was! I did hope you would manage it. Isn’t there anything that would tempt you for your tea?”
    Angel could think of so many things, poached eggs, welsh rarebit, smoked haddock covered with butter; but she shook her head.
    By the evening, she was painfully bored. Although she did not feel ill, she was suffering from a slackness of spirit, a heavy dullness in her heart. She longed for a different life: to be quite grown-up and beautiful and rich; to have power over many different kinds of men. To pass the time, she began to imagine herself living such a life, in one scene, sharply visual, after another. She did not bother with narrative or explanations. She simply, in her dreams, was at the centre of each scene, very much herself still, with her green eyes and her black hair but with a few things changed; she took a shade off the length of her nose, which seemed to her too long for romance.
    She was at Osborne, wearing red velvet, when her mother brought in some bread and milk for her supper; and, as soon as she had eaten it, she made haste to return there. Bowing her head, she went down in a deep curtsy and her skirt spread out like a flower. Her garnets were a dark fire on her white skin. Then the old Queen did an unexpected, a gracious thing, which sent a murmur through those present. She leaned forward and kissed Angel’s brow.
    When Mrs Deverell had smoothed the bed, letting in all the draughts, making her comfortable for the night, as she called it, and left her in darkness, Angel went on with her pictures. She even attempted to set one of them at Paradise House, but her imagination had healed earlier than her heart and she winced at the pain she gave herself.
    She was not tired and she lay for hours planning romantic triumphs for herself.