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not beause I think any less of your painting, but because I think less of you. You have neither the commitment nor work discipline to be great, Jack, because you always forget that genius is only one per cent inspiration and ninety-nine per cent sheer, bloody graft. I'm a good doctor, not because I have an especial talent for diagnosis, but because I work my fingers to the bone. You're a rotten artist, not because you lack talent, but because you're too damn lazy and too damn snobbish to get down on your hands and knees with the rest of us and earn your reputation."
    The dark face split into a sardonic grin. "Hewitt's doing, I suppose? A cosy little supper with Cock Robin and his wife, and then it's dump on Jack. Jesus, he's a easy little toad. He'd be in your bed quicker than inking if sweet little Mary and the kiddiwinkles weren't guarding his door."
    "Don't be absurd," she said coldly. "It's your doing entirely. I ceased having any feelings for you whatsoever the day I had to refer Sally Bennedict for an abortion. I draw the line at being asked to approve the murder of your bastards, Jack, particularly by a selfish bitch like Sally Bennedict. She enjoyed the irony of it all, believe me."
    He stared at her with something like shock, and she saw that for once she had scored a direct hit. He hadn't known, she thought, which was something in his favour at least. "You should have told me," he said inadequately.
    She laughed with genuine amusement. "Why? You weren't my patient, Sally was. And, sure as eggs is eggs, she wasn't going to go to term with your little bundle of joy and lose her chance with the RSC. You can't play Juliet six months pregnant, Jack, which is what she would have been when the run started. Oh, I did my bit, suggested she talk it through with you, suggested she talk it through with a counsellor, but I might have been pissing in the wind for all the good it did. She'd have preferred cancer, I think, to an unwanted pregnancy." Her smile was twisted. "And let's face it, we both knew what your reaction would be. It's the only time I've felt confident that the wretched foetus, were it born, would be rejected by both parties. I passed the buck on to the hospital and they had
her
in and
it
out within two weeks."
    He swirled his brush aimlessly around the colours on his palette. "Was that the reason for the sudden move down here?"
    "Partly. I had a nasty feeling Sally would be the first of many."
    "And the other part?"
    "I didn't think the wilds of Dorset would appeal to you. I hoped you'd stay in London."
    "You should have told me," he said again. "I never was very good at taking hints."
    "No."
    He put the palette and the brush on a stool and started to wipe his hands with a kitchen towel dipped in turpentine. "So how come the year's grace? Charity? Or malice? Did you think it would be more fun to cast me adrift down here than in London where I'd be assured of a bed?"
    "Neither," she said. "Hope. Misplaced, as usual." She glanced at the canvas.
    He followed her gaze. "I had tea with her. Nothing more."
    "I believe you."
    "Why so angry then? I'm not making a scene because you had supper with Robin."
    "I'm not angry, Jack. I'm bored. Bored with being the necessary audience that your ridiculous ego requires. I sometimes think that was the real reason you married me, not for security but because you needed somebody else's emotion to stimulate your creativity." She gave a hollow laugh. "In that case you should never have married a doctor. We see too much of it at work to play it all out again at home."
    He studied her closely. "That's it then, is it? My marching orders? Pack your bags, Jack, and never darken my door again."
    She smiled the Mona Lisa smile that had first bewitched him. He thought he could predict exactly what she was going to say.
It's your life, make your own decisions.
For Sarah's strength and her weakness was her belief that everyone was as confident and single-minded as she was.
    "Yes," she said,