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from the cars, she found her way down to the Fulham Road, well remembered from her childhood, but much altered, change upon change, much of it very recent. The grand old villas had mostly been converted to flats, or demolished altogether to be replaced by shops and restaurants and gas stations and estate agents. And you could see the scars of flooding everywhere, tide marks on low walls, slick mud in front gardens, a lingering scent of sewage. Many of the properties were boarded up, in fact, condemned because of flood damage.
    She cut down Fulham High Street, heading for Putney Bridge Road. A ticket outlet advertised discounted seats at all the West End shows. Amanda had told her it was so difficult traveling now that it was easy to get tickets for the opera, the shows, even the big football matches. Always free tables in the restaurants too, but the menus were restricted because the international food distribution business was so badly hit.
    Before she reached the river she cut down some steps to reach Bishop’s Park, a leafy garden over which the slim tower of Fulham Palace thrust to the sky. The rain, not too heavy, hissed from the thick summer leaves of very old trees. The lawns were flooded, and ducks and moorhens swam complacently on ponds that bristled with long grass and stranded trees.
    She found Gary sitting on a bench on the footpath by the riverbank, before a green railing from which hung an orange lifebelt. Lily sat down with him. Gary was humming softly, and tapping his feet. Evidently he’d discovered Angels. He had always talked about how he missed music, down in the cellars; Lily guessed he was catching up.
    The Thames was high and fast-moving, it seemed to her, an angry gray beast that forced its way under the pale sandstone arches of Putney Bridge. On the far bank boathouses glistened in the rain; nobody was out rowing today.
    Gary said, “I counted seven joggers since I’ve been sitting here. And four people with dogs.”
    “Somewhere in this park,” Lily said, “is a memorial to the International Brigade. Who fought for the republic in the Spanish Civil War.”
    “Small world,” he said. “Your sister’s hospitable. Made me welcome.”
    “Well, that’s her job, sort of. She’s an events coordinator. She’s been having time off since she found out I was released. She says she’s taking the kids out of school and to the Dome in Greenwich tomorrow, end-of-term educational treat stuff . . .”
    “That river looks high to me.”
    “And to me.”
    “Is it still tidal, as far as this?”
    “I think so.”
    “Look at this.” He produced a handheld, a gift from AxysCorp, on which he’d been watching news and recording clips; he shielded it from the rain with his hand.
    It wasn’t just London. Much of the country was in the grip of chronic flooding, which seemed to have become a regular event. Britain’s great rivers were all swollen, all had broken their banks somewhere, and there were refugee camps, parks of caravans and tents, on higher ground near the Trent, the Clyde, the Severn as far as Shrewsbury. There was a particular crisis unfolding this summer in Liverpool. Lily was shocked by a satellite image of East Anglia. The sea had pushed deeply beyond its old bounds across the Fens, lapping toward Wisbech and Spalding, and there were free-standing lakes everywhere, dark blue in the processed image.
    The images seemed unreal. Lily was surprised everybody wasn’t talking constantly about what seemed to her an immense transformation. But she supposed that over the years you got used to it. It was just that she had been fast-forwarded to an unfamiliar future.
    Gary said, “Some of these incidents are fluvial—exceptional rain, flooding rivers. The coastal events come from the sea, obviously . . . I guess you got the call from Helen.”
    “Yes. I never knew that bastard Said was the son of a Saudi prince. We were privileged to be abused by him.”
    “Yeah, so we were,” he said