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and felt its gentle pressure. ‘I shall be seeing you,’ Mr Cordle said. In any other setting, Marcus would have been astonished at such a greeting, but the, eccentricity of Madame Sousatzka and Uncle had already conditioned him to such oddities. ‘Why?’ he asked.
    â€˜I am an osteopath,’ Mr Cordle said. Marcus didn’t know what the word meant, but he was too shy to ask. He hoped he would remember it so that he could ask his mother. Or better, look it up in his dictionary in case it was something his mother disapproved of.
    â€˜And Jenny,’ Madame Sousatzka was saying. Jenny didn’t get up. She stretched out her left hand and took Marcus’s in her own. She looked carefully at his palm.‘You’re right, Sousatzka,’ she said. ‘In his hand it’s a famous name.’ She gave Marcus a broad smile and Marcus saw how young and pretty she was. ‘I’ll tell Momma about Jenny and Mr Cordle,’ he thought, but immediately decided against it. The number of facts he was piling up to conceal from his mother excited him but at the same time made him feel guilty. He knew that he could cry at will, simply by thinking of her lisle-stockinged feet. He hoped he could keep the thought out of his mind at least until the meal was over and he was in bed. Then he would cry and feel better. And tomorrow when they went home from Madame Sousatzka’s, even if he told her nothing about Mr Cordle or Uncle or Jenny, he would hold her hand.
    Madame Sousatzka placed him at the head of the table and she herself sat at the other end. There was a dish of cold chicken on the table and a bowl of tinned pears, which Marcus took to be for dessert. He was astonished to see Madame Sousatzka, Cordle and Jenny help themselves to both at the same time. When the dishes were passed to him he did likewise, though he was sure he would hate the combination. But he had the feeling that all these people, especially if they lived with Madame Sousatzka, were the right people, doing the right things and thinking the right thoughts. As he looked at the white meat on his plate and the pear juice seeping from its weave, he felt he was one of them. But only partly. He felt, too, an unhappy sense of betrayal of Stamford Hill. He wondered what his mother … and with the sudden thought of his mother, even without the lisle stockings, he knew he was going to cry. He ate a mouthful of food quickly, hoping to swallow the lump in his throat along with it. Jenny noticed his discomfort.
    â€˜Marcus,’ she said, smiling at him, ‘next Friday after your lesson, you must come and have tea in my room. D’you like crumpets?’
    For Marcus the word was nearer home, miles and miles away from the concept of chicken and pears. His mother bought him crumpets every Monday. He suddenly loved Jenny. Yes, he decided, without any doubt, he could tell his mother about her.
    He helped Jenny with the washing-up after supper, and when he went to bed, both Jenny and Madame Sousatzka kissed him. Cordle parted from him with the same words with which he had greeted him. ‘I’ll be seeing you,’ and to his dismay Marcus realized that he had forgotten the word Cordle said he was.
    He got into his bed, his mind whirling with thoughts about the Sousatzka establishment. Automatically he turned over his pillow, and then he realized that he was a long way from home. He suddenly remembered the second parcel his mother had given him. He reached under his bed and brought out three clean raw carrots. They make you see in the dark, or they make your hair grow curly. Or was that cabbage? Vegetables, vegetables, vegetables. He munched at one slowly, keeping his hand pressed hard on his hair to stop it from curling. He wondered vaguely how to dispose of the other two carrots. He would tell his mother that she’d been right. He’d enjoyed them. He’d been grateful for them. More lies. One day, when he was