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I suppose I must describe James’s funeral as I said I was going to. There was something curiously blank about it. I did not have to organize it, thank heaven. It was organized by a Colonel Blackthorn who appeared for this purpose and then vanished. When I got to London on the day after the doctor’s letter I found Colonel Blackthorn and the doctor both actually in James’s flat. The colonel explained that he had organized the funeral (a cremation) because they had been unable to get in touch with me, but that if I wished for something different . . . I did not. I tried to talk to the doctor but he faded away while Blackthorn was still explaining to me how to get to the crematorium. ‘James’ had already mercifully been removed to the ‘chapel of rest’. I did not visit him.

The cremation took place two days later at one of those huge garden places in north London. There is something comfortlessly empty about a ‘garden of remembrance’ after the loquacious populated feeling of a graveyard. It was a stiff graceless business, rather hurried on by the staff, who kept us waiting outside while the previous ‘customer’ was disposed of. Doubtless the worthy colonel’s despatch in booking our ‘slot’ had been a prudent one. He was there, also the doctor. Toby Ellesmere came and seemed genuinely upset. I had never reflected before (and have not since) upon the nature of his relation with James, but whatever it was I imagine it belonged to the remote past. James and Toby had not only been young soldiers together, they had been school boys together. Perhaps Toby had simply admired him at school; such bonds can be life-long. Four other well-dressed men in smart black suits turned up, I presume they were soldiers. They showed no signs of knowing who I was, and they were unknown to Toby, with whom I exchanged a few words; indeed no one except Toby talked to me at all. The business took minutes. There was no prayer of course, only a little soft listless music and then a standing in silence, which was broken by some official noisily opening the door at the back. I wished then that there could have been a proper ceremony of some sort. But any ritual I could have devised would probably have offended James’s shade. I only wish I had had the wit to demand some decent music to see him off with.

We went outside into the garden. Colonel Blackthorn shook hands with me. Everybody began to go away. Again I tried to speak to the doctor, but he said he was expected at the hospital. Perhaps he was feeling a bit nervous about that death certificate. Toby rather half-heartedly offered me a lift in his car, but I declined. I think he wanted to be alone too. I walked about for a long time in shabby sad back-streets and lost myself.

I have just found in a drawer in the kitchen the hammer which I was trying to mend on the last evening when James came to Shruff End. He must have taken the precaution of carrying it away with him. I like the kitchen. There is a large dry larder, completely empty when I arrived. There is also a view of Battersea Power Station, which in the evening looks like an Assyrian monument.

I have sold my flat in Shepherds Bush and brought some of the furniture here. I brought back my own stuff from Shruff End, but none of Mrs Chorney’s. I resisted a temptation to keep the art nouveau oval mirror which Rosina broke and which I never had reglazed. I have put most of my things into James’s dressing room. This is now, inside James’s temple, a little Charles shrine. I go there sometimes and sit. My books are still in crates in the hall. My clothes are mostly in suitcases, since I cannot yet bring myself to touch James’s neatly hanging, neatly folded garments. The big wardrobe in his bedroom is like the entrance to another world. I cannot say I feel at home in the flat, but I would not think of living anywhere else. Sometimes it seems incredible that he is not here too. Last night I was so persuaded that he was in the next room that I had to go and look.

I saw Lizzie and