On Tuesday morning, someone downstairs tried the locked workshop door.
Daniel came out of sleep with Ada's name ready in his mouth. He was halfway down the stairs before he remembered where she might be, who was on his sofa, what he had done beside the bird.
The visitor was a customer bringing a chipped oval mirror. Daniel told her he couldn't take work today. She looked at his face, then at the mirror she had wrapped in a supermarket bag, and said she could come back.
Behind him, Julian made coffee.
The ordinary sounds were worse in daylight. Water running. A spoon put down. Someone who now knew how much milk he took.
Julian brought a mug to the bench and said nothing about the kiss. Daniel was grateful, then resentful of how easily the man could make him grateful.
“I'm going to try Ruth again,” Daniel said.
“Her friend?”
“Yes.”
“Did you get through yesterday?”
“No.”
He was looking for the number when the workshop landline rang.
Daniel snatched it up.
“Mercer Glass.”
For a second he heard only movement, the muffled handling of a phone.
Then Ada said, “Dan.”
He closed his eyes.
“Where are you?”
“Before you do anything, there's one more thing.”
She had said that to him on their first job together. He had thought the window finished, and she had told him she needed a little clear pane at the bottom to see people coming. Afterwards it became the thing she said when he was almost asleep and she wanted to tell him about her day.
“Tell me. Just tell me where—”
Julian moved closer. “Is it her?”
Ada stopped speaking.
Daniel turned away from him.
“Ada?”
“Is he there?”
“He came yesterday.”
“I can't—”
The call ended.
Daniel held the receiver against his ear until a flat tone began.
“What did she say?” Julian asked.
“She's alive.”
“Did she say that?”
“She was speaking.”
“I mean, where is she?”
“I don't know.”
Julian looked at the telephone as though it had cheated both of them. “She's doing this to us.”
Daniel put the receiver down.
“She heard you.”
“She heard you too.”
“That isn't the same.”
“No,” Julian said. “Perhaps it isn't.”
He went to the kettle. Daniel wanted to ask him to leave. Then Ada might call again and he'd be alone hearing whichever version she chose to tell him. He went outside and rang Cole's contact number instead, leaving the information that Ada had called but he didn't know where she was. His own voice sounded measured and useful. It wasn't what his hands were doing.
Ruth arrived shortly before noon with a folded sheet of cream paper.
Daniel knew her from visits to the workshop. She had a shaved strip under her dark hair and usually wore a scarf Ada said was ugly enough to be protective. Today she wore no scarf. There was dried ink on the side of her neck.
“She's safe,” she said before he could ask. “I'm sorry you were left like this.”
“Where is she?”
“She wants to speak with you.”
“Then why doesn't she?”
“She tried.”
Julian had come downstairs. Ruth looked at him, then back at Daniel.
“Is this Julian?”
“Yes,” Julian said. “I'm her husband.”
“I know who you are.”
The way she said it changed the workshop.
He stepped towards her. “Where is she staying?”
“You can ask Ada what she wants to tell you.”
“I'm not asking about her feelings. I'm asking where she is.”
“And I'm not giving you that.”
Ruth handed Daniel the paper. Her fingers were warm from being folded around it.
Ada's handwriting leaned sharply forwards.
Dan. I am safe. I know you have heard things. I need to tell you what I did, and I can't do that with Julian beside you. Please use the number below. Ada.
He read the words I did three times.
“She's with you?”
“Use the number,” Ruth said. “You can speak to her directly. That's what I came for.”
“You're helping her hide.”
“I'm giving you a way to talk.”
He felt the unfairness of his accusation and could not quite take it back. Ruth waited, as if he might find the words. He folded the note along its existing crease instead.
“Has she been to the police?”
“She needs to make that call today. I've told her.”
“Needs to?”
“She isn't taking every piece of advice I give her.”
For a moment Ada emerged from the note as someone capable of irritating a friend. Daniel found that more reassuring than safe.
Ruth left without having tea. She said she had a job on the press, and Ada would answer the phone. Julian watched her go.
“She's always disliked me.”
“Has she?”
“Apparently.”
Daniel put the note in his pocket. The number was Ruth’s, the same one he had called without an answer. There was nothing preventing him from trying it again.
Instead he looked at Julian's cheek. At the hands which had held a mug and his wrist. At the canvas bag upstairs, belonging to a life Ada had failed to mention.
“I want to see your flat,” he said.
Julian's face changed, then settled.
“All right.”
“Where she was living.”
“I know what you mean.”
Daniel didn't think he did. Ada’s toothbrush. A bed. Something large and ugly enough to settle the terrible pleasure he had taken from this man.
Julian reached for his car keys.