Last night I went to Evensong at King’s for the first time. Oh, Mummy, it was incredible. The voices soared, and for a little while I soared with them, imagining myself floating above Cambridge in the clear night, held only by a silver tether of sound. I sat next to a Trinity boy, very serious, who invited me to a poetry reading on Thursday in his rooms. So you see, I already have a social engagement, and you needn’t have worried about me.

If the weather’s fine on Sunday I mean to walk to Grantchester along the river path. I’ll pretend I’m Virginia Woolf going to visit Rupert Brooke. We’ll have tea in the garden at the Old Vicarage and discuss important things: poetry and philosophy and life.

Darling Mother, I’m sure I haven’t thanked you properly. You made me work when I felt tired or cranky; you encouraged me when I couldn’t see past some trivial setback; you built me up when I lost faith in myself. If it weren’t for your vision and determination I’d probably be standing behind the chemist’s counter today, dispensing cough syrup and milk of magnesia, instead of here, in this most glorious of places. I’ll write in a day or two and give you my schedule. I want to share this with you.

Your loving… Lydia

CHAPTER 4

My restless blood now lies a-quiver,

Knowing that always, exquisitely,

This April twilight on the river

Stirs anguish in the heart of me.

RUPERT BROOKE,

from “Blue Evening”

Kincaid had kept his word to Vic, ringing his friend, Chief Inspector Alec Byrne, first thing Monday morning, but it wasn’t until midday Wednesday that he found the time to go to Cambridge. Having decided he’d put enough wear and tear on the Midget for one week, he took the train, stretching his legs out in the empty compartment and dozing between stations. A little more than an hour after leaving King’s Cross, he paid off a taxi in front of the cinder-block building on Parkside Road that housed the Cambridge police.