I travel down to London for the tribunal, because I don’t want to miss the excitement. Vera and I meet in a cafe opposite the building in Islington where the tribunal is to be held. Although we have talked on the phone, it is the first time we have actually met since Mother’s funeral. We look each other up and down. I have made a special effort, and am wearing a this-season Oxfam jacket, a white blouse and dark trousers. Vera is wearing a stylishly crumpled jacket and skirt in earth-coloured linen. Cautiously, we lean forward and each peck the air at the side of the other’s cheek.

“How lovely to see you, Nadia.”

“You too, Vera.”

We are treading on eggshells.

Giving ourselves plenty of time, we take our places at the back of the courtroom, which is in a sombre oak-panelled chamber where oblique sunlight filters through windows too high to see out of. A few minutes before the hearing starts Valentina and Stanislav enter. Valentina has excelled herself: gone is the navy polyester with the pink lining. She is wearing a white dress and black-and-white hound’s-tooth check jacket, cut low at the front to show her cleavage, but cleverly darted and tailored to conceal her bulk. Above her blonde bouffant perches a small white pillbox hat with cut-out flowers in black silk. Her lipstick and nails are blood-red. Stanislav is wearing the uniform and tie of his posh school, and has had a haircut.

She catches sight of us as soon as she comes in and lets out a low cry. The blond young man accompanying her, whom we take to be her counsel, follows the line of her gaze, and they confer quietly as they take their places. He is wearing a suit so sharp and a tie so bright that we are sure he is not a Peterborough lad.

Everyone has made an effort to dress up except the three members of the tribunal, who come in a few moments later, dressed in unfashionably baggy trousers and not-stylishly crumpled jackets. They introduce themselves, and at once Valentina’s counsel rises to his feet and asks for an interpreter for his client. The tribunal members confer, the clerk is consulted, then a plump woman with frizzed hair enters from a side door, seats herself in front of Valentina and Stanislav and introduces herself to them. I can hear them gasp. Now the young barrister rises again, points to Vera and me sitting at the back, and objects to our presence. He is overruled. Finally he rises again, and launches into a long and eloquent account of the love-match between Valentina and my father, how love-at-first-sight swept them off their feet at a function in the Ukrainian Club in Peterborough, how he pleaded with her to marry him, bombarded her with letters and poems-the young man waves a wodge of photocopies in the air-and how happy they were before the two daughters-he points to me and Vera-started to interfere.

He has been speaking for perhaps ten minutes when there is a commotion and the usher rushes in with several sheets of paper which she places before the chairman. He skims through them and then passes them to the other two panellists.

“And he would be present in person to testify his love for my client, were it not that a chest infection, coupled with his extreme age and frailty, have prevented him from travelling here today.” The young man’s voice rises to a climax. The chairman politely waits for him to finish, then he holds up the papers which the usher brought in.

“I would find your speech most convincing, Mr Ericson,” he says, “were it not that just at this moment we have received a fax from Mrs Mayevska’s husband’s solicitor in Peterborough, with details of a divorce petition he has filed in respect ofyour client.”

Valentina jumps to her feet, and turns to where Vera and I are sitting.

“This is doing of this evil witch sister!” she cries combing the air with her scarlet nails.

“Please listen, Mr Sir,” she puts her hands together in a gesture of prayer and appeals to the chairman, “I am love husband.”

The interpreter, miffed at being excluded from the drama, butts in:

“She says that the sisters are evil witches. She wants to say that she loves her husband.”

Vera and I keep quiet and look prim.

“Mr Ericson?” the chairman asks.

The young man has gone scarlet beneath his pale hair.

“I would like to ask for a ten-minute adjournment while I consult with my client.”

“Granted.”

As they file out of the courtroom, I can hear him hissing beneath his breath to Valentina something like, “…you’ve made a complete fool of me…”

Ten minutes later, Mr Ericson conies back on his own.

“My client is withdrawing her appeal,” he says.

“Did you see the way he winked at us?” says Vera.

“Who?”

“The chairman. He winked.”

“No! I didn’t see. Did he really?”

“I thought he was so sexy.”

“Sexy?”

“Very sort of English and crumpled. I do so like English men.”

“But not Dick”

“Dick was English and crumpled when we first met. I liked him then. Before he met Persephone.”

We are sitting side by side with our feet up on a wide sofa in Vera’s Putney flat. In front of us on a low table are two glasses and a bottle of chilled white wine, almost empty. Dave Brubeck plays quietly in the background. After the alliance of the courtroom, it seemed the most natural thing in the world for me to come back here. It is a cool white-painted flat, with deep pale carpets and very little but very expensive furniture. I have never been here before.

“I like your flat, Vera. It’s so much nicer than where you used to live with Dick.”

“You haven’t been here before? Of course not. Well, maybe you’ll come again.”

“I hope so. Or maybe you’ll come up to Cambridge one weekend.”

“Maybe.”

When Vera lived with Dick, I visited their house once or twice-it was full of polished wood and elaborate wall-paper which I found pretentious and gloomy.

“What do you suppose it means, Vera-that she’s withdrawing her appeal? Will she give up altogether? Or do you think it just means she will ask for another date?”

“Perhaps she will simply melt away into the criminal underworld where she belongs. After all, they can only deport her if they can find her.”

Vera has lit a cigarette and thrown off her shoes.

“Or it could just mean she will go back and work on Pappa. Get him to back down on the divorce. I’m sure he would if she went about it the right way.”

“He’s certainly stupid enough.” Vera watches a long finger of ash glow at the end of her cigarette. “But I think she will go to ground. Hide herself in a secret lair somewhere. Live off fraudulent benefit claims and prostitution.” The ash falls silently into a glass ashtray. Vera sighs. “Soon enough she will latch on to another victim.”

“But Pappa can divorce her in her absence.”

“Let’s hope so. The question is how much he has to pay her to get rid of her.”

As we are talking, my eyes wander around the room. There is a vase of pale pink peonies on the mantelpiece, and beside them a row of photographs, mainly of Vera and Dick and the children, some in colour, some in black and white. But one photograph is in sepia, in a silver frame. I stare. Can it be? Yes it is. It is the photograph of Mother wearing the hat. She must have taken it from the box in the sitting-room. But when? And why didn’t she say anything? I feel an angry colour rising in my cheeks.

“Vera, the photograph of Mother…”

“Oh, yes. Delightful isn’t it? Such an enchanting hat.”

“But, it isn’t yours.”

“Not mine? The hat?”

“The photograph, Vera. It’s not yours.”

I jump to my feet, knocking over my wineglass. A pool of Sauvignon blanc forms on the table and drips on to the carpet.

“What’s the matter, Nadia? It’s only a photograph, for goodness’ sake.”

“I must go. I don’t want to miss the last train.”

“But won’t you stay the night? The bed’s made up in the little room.”