Believers. I mean, where have they all gone? - Bernard MacLaverty

She rummaged in her bag and produced a postcard she'd bought in the museum shop. Old Woman Reading. It was not the painting she had seen but a different one. When she'd asked for the postcard the assistant had shrugged and said they were out of it. There are many old women reading, she said. The assistant had offered her another, even better, card. An old woman, cowled in some dark material, looking down at a book. It was so lovely - the concentration in the eyes, the luminescence of the ancient face reflected from the page, the interior light from reading whatever was printed there.

Now that they had mobile phones, theoretically it should have been easier to keep tabs on one another. But practically it had not helped. In the first instance you had to remember to bring the bloody thing with you. If you had it with you, invariably one or other of the mobiles was switched off or needed charging. And then, even if you did get through, Stella's phone had some mysterious setting which diverted incoming calls straight to 'Leave a message'. And her phone did not ring. And she did not answer it.

Neil offered his arm as she lowered herself from the step to the ground. "What a polite young man." "That's my mother's fault."