Issenden is a second skin. I spent large chunks of the school holidays here. Free from my parents’ bickering. Fierce anger that billowed into volcanic fury. Away from them with Uncle Diskan. Discovering authors on the crowded shelves. Turning my head to read the titles of books laid horizontally on the tops of others. First editions. Standing democratically with modern volumes. Listening to my uncle playing the piano. Picking out maimed versions of what I could remember when he was elsewhere in the house. ‘You’re improving,’ he said. ‘You should have lessons.’ He took me to Mrs Brone.
       Issenden. I know every angle, every junction of the maze of interconnected rooms. I know how to run up the zigzag of stairs without a sound. I can find my way through its corridors in the dark and I can break free of its embrace through a side door onto the lawn which flows through the trees to an iron gate that moves glides on permanently oiled hinges. For a moment, the house becomes part of the outside world.
       Briefly.
       Before the gate shuts with a click. Keeping the house safe.
       Issenden.
       A haven.
       Jant brakes a little way from the porch. I study the reddish fuzz of hair above his collar. I wait for him to turn to display the swell of flesh at the corner of his mouth. The tasty nub, waiting. But he’s out of the car. Jasrene’s watchdog.
       The front door is unlocked. Light from Deco glass drenches the walls. A Persian rug blazes with colour. Sculpture on a console table. Swollen curves of marble. Sightless eyes. Voluptuous. Vulnerable.
       My uncle is in the sitting room. Tall windows. Taffeta curtains the colour of smoke.
       ‘I thought you’d be here sooner.’ He’s at one end of the sofa. Relaxed. A glass of black champagne. Spinning flakes of gold.
       Uncle Diskan. Elegant in cashmere. Tennis-slim. Knowing. He fills the glass on the table by his side.
       ‘Here.’
       The lazy spin of golden scales.
       ‘And here?’ He pats the adjacent cushion. ‘How much time is there?’
       Knowing. As calm as I am fearful.
       I sit. I don’t quite focus on his profile.
       ‘How was the Prokofiev? I hear you played well.’
       I don’t drink. He refills his glass.
       We sat here when he read to me. The Enchanter’s Dark. The chapters introduced with watercolours. Xavier Dutron. Before the glacier formed and made its undetectable flow, Kataka and Sulia, brotherly Princes, rode down to fight for the kingdom. Dutron’s exquisite landscapes. Forests loaded with mystery. Brotherly Princes battling for the kingdom. He read it so often, I was able to speak it silently with him, until he saw that I knew it by heart and one day made me recite it to him. Page by page as he lay back, eyes closed, mesmerised by the cadence of my voice.         ‘My heart sings,’ he said. He gave me the silver bracelet he was wearing.
       I wanted that time again. A time before destiny took hold of me.
       ‘Jasrene called. She’s proud of you. But I wonder if she loves you as I do. She resented our time together. Big, Bad Uncle Diskan. It’s of no consequence now. Maybe to care is enough. I hope so – a world without any love at all would be bleak.’
       He eases round to face me.
       ‘You’re so like her: extraordinary, determined. But you make your own way.’ When he smiles, there’s no joy in his eyes. ‘A true Bevendex.’
       An eternity is passing. Here with Uncle Diskan. Slowly. A century in every second. I feel weight of the syringe tug my pocket. It’s suddenly heavy, as though it might drag me through the sofa and the floor and the foundations of Issenden. Deep into the suffocating press of the damp earth.
       ‘You’re wearing the bracelet. That’s kind.’
       He stands. Motionless. Tennis slim in the fading evening light.
       ‘All this,’ he says. ‘And in a second, oblivion.’
       He comes to me and stoops to kiss my forehead.
       ‘Dear Leh. Are you really as cool as you seem? I can hear your heart galloping.’
       Thunder fills every corner of the room.
       ‘Do you remember what I told you at the lake? You must do what is right, even though it is contrary to your instinct.’
       I shut my eyes.
       ‘Look at me,’ he says.
       His eyes are pale green. One has a dark freckle of brown, as slender as a pine needle.
       ‘You didn’t tell me how much time we had.’ He pours the last of the champagne. The last gold flakes glitter on his lips. ‘You’ll be gone soon enough. Duty done.’ He drinks quickly, sipping, swallowing until the glass stands empty. ‘From now on, each step will come faster than the one before, my dear, sweet boy. Step upon step, carrying you to an alien landscape. A place you never wanted to be, but which you can’t avoid.­’
       The syringe catches in the seam my pocket. Uncle Diskan knows I’m easing its position.
       ‘It’s stuffy. We need some air.’ A small smile. Apologetic. A farewell.
       He rests his head back against the sofa as I open the window behind him. He waits. As Boleyn must have waited, kneeling in final, trembling anticipation of the falling axe.
       ‘That’s better,’ he says. ‘Now we can relax.’