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yet contained in a space of my own. Then the flight to Auckland: one long sleep cocooned in a capsule racing through the air. Another hotel. Sightseeing. The human intercourses I experienced brief and impersonal. Yet logically, there must have been many situations with more promise.
    But it was here, on the deserted beach that stretched before me now, that I came to stop.

    Before stepping out of the car she removes first her earrings, then her watch and the clasp that holds her hair together. Then her shoes. She needs to rid herself of all that connects her with the person she was. Shed the past. Here she is, dressed in her light cotton dress and nothing else. She has the car keys in her hand, but that is all she carries. As she descends the snaking ladder that leads down to the beach the breeze blows her hair and lifts her skirt. At the bottom she stops in the shade of the trees, looking out over the beach and the sea.
    She is still Marion Flint. Yet not the one she used to be. She is still thirty-six years old. She has been here on the other side of the world just a few days. Yet the old world is fading fast. Something new is beginning. Here, by herself, in an environment that doesn’t acknowledge her presence, she finally feels a kind of hope. She can breathe. That is how it feels. As if she were born just now, just here, and released of all that has been before.
    The vast beach lies in front of her. There is not a person in sight. In the distance, the air quivers over the mirror created by the latest withdrawing wave. She stands still, her feet deep in the warm sand. It is as if this is where she wants to be forever. To see the world as it appears at this exact moment.
    I am just a speck. A grain of sand, she thinks.
    She starts to walk towards the water. The sand is very hot and she has to run to reach the sea. She lets the waves lap against her legs, and even here, with the water only up to her shins, she can feel the pull as the sand is dragged away around her feet. She bends down and wets her hands, and puts the palms on her cheeks. The water is cool against her skin and salty on her tongue.
    She walks along the edge of the water. The roar of the sea fills the air and the only sound that penetrates is the odd shriek of a bird. There are no smells other than the sea. No other visual impressions. It is as if the sea occupies all her senses. She is completely enveloped by it, as insignificant as the shells that roll in the surf.
    She carries on, keeping to the cool wet sand near the sea. Stops here and there to pick up a smooth pebble or a polished shell. She walks much further than she had intended, letting the breeze tousle her hair and the salt spray set on her skin. The beach is endless, one smooth bay following the next. And no sign of any human presence.
    Eventually she slows down, and when she spots a large log lying further up the beach she heads for it. Again, she has to run over the hot sand.
    It is not until she almost stumbles on it that she sees it. And for a split second her brain leaves the visual impression to be interpreted by the part that has hitherto spotted stones and shells. The part of her brain that has noticed the beauty of the towering waves and the sweeping surf. Shapes and forms, light and colour.
    For that brief moment it is a natural object of beauty, nothing else.
    But it is a man’s body. And it is naked.
    It is a man lying face down on a beach towel with a camera bag beside him.
    He must have felt her presence because he wakes with a start, twisting to look at her without turning over. She takes a few steps back.
    â€˜I am so sorry, I just didn’t see you,’ she says. Which is partly true.
    He is busy trying to wrap the beach towel around himself before struggling to his feet.
    â€˜Ah . . .’ he says, stumbling a little before standing in front of her with the towel around his hips. ‘Well, I’m sorry too. I thought I was alone here.’
    Then he