Page 83 of The Fall-Out

I looked through the window at the paper-covered tablecloths where studenty-looking couples sat drinking red wine, their faces illuminated by candlelight. I was starving, I realised.

‘Works for me.’

‘So,’ Rowan said, once we were seated and smearing salty butter thickly on to slices of baguette. ‘We need a plan.’

‘Did you try calling the hospital?’ I’d vaguely suggested this when we spoke the previous day.

Rowan shook her head. ‘I tried googling, but I could tell straight away I was on a hiding to nothing. There are loads of different ones and I can’t tell from Zara’s Facebook posts which one she’s in. Same with Dr Hubert – there seem to be about three gynaecologists called that in Paris and even if I got the right one, there’s no way he’d tell me anything. They’re even hotter on data protection here than in the UK.’

‘So plan B – we go to her apartment. She must have been discharged by now. Unless…’

We looked at each other in silence over the flickering candle flame. We didn’t need to say the words – Unless something went wrong with the surgery. Unless it was even more serious than she thought. Unless something went wrong and she…

‘We’ll cross that bridge if we come to it,’ Rowan said firmly. ‘I’m sure she’s fine. I bet this Hubert guy’s whipped out more uteruses than you’ve had hot dinners.’

‘And speaking of which…’

A waiter had appeared with our food, chunky white china plates piled high with glorious smelling beans and sausage, a green salad glistening with oil and another basket of bread. He filled our wine glasses from the carafe on the table and smiled at Rowan the way men always smiled at Rowan.

We ate and drank in silence for a while, then I said, ‘Do we even know where she lives?’

‘She used to have a flat in Canal Saint-Martin – hipster as hell, like you’d expect. I remember her saying she shared with another girl – a model. But I don’t know if she’s still there, or even what her name was.’

‘I remember her mentioning it. Danielle? Something like that.’

‘Yeah, we could start by having a look on Facebook and working our way through all the Danielles in Paris.’

‘Or maybe not.’ I sighed. ‘So hitting Danielle up on social media and telling her we’ve come to visit Zara looks like a non-starter. It was ages ago, anyway. Zara’s moved all over the place since then.’

‘I mean, we could just go there,’ Rowan suggested. ‘She might have left a forwarding address.’

‘You mean, like, now?’

Rowan glanced at her watch. ‘It’s gone nine thirty. I reckon we should sleep on it and try Danielle in the morning.’

Relief washed over me. One night wasn’t much of a reprieve, but it was a reprieve all the same. We paid for our meal and walked back to the hotel through the buzzing Friday-night streets. Back in our room, I FaceTimed Patch, heard to my relief that the children were safe in bed, then fell into bed myself and – to my surprise – slept dreamlessly all night.

The next day was glorious – sunny and fresh, the air sparkling and the scent of coffee and croissants drifting out from the pavement cafés. Rowan and I picked one of them for breakfast, and she perused her phone while we ate.

‘I reckon I’ll be able to find the place,’ she said. ‘One good thing about being an estate agent is it gives you a killer memory for where houses are. And if Gabrielle – that’s her name, not Danielle at all, I remembered at like five a.m. – if she’s not there, we can leave our numbers with the concierge or someone and ask her to ring us.’

‘And if Gabrielle doesn’t live there any more, we can come up with a plan B,’ I said, thinking, Or give up the whole idea and go home.

But the prospect of there being a concierge – an anonymous taker of messages rather than an old friend of Zara’s to whom we’d have explain everything – emboldened me. We finished our coffee and I followed Rowan to the Metro station, on to one line and then on to another, and then out again into a pretty neighbourhood with tidy terraced houses lining the banks of a slow-flowing canal.

I hurried to match Rowan’s long stride as she strode confidently past a little parade of shops, away from the meandering water of the canal, and into a maze of narrow cobbled streets. Occasionally she’d stop, frowning, consulting her phone then apparently her own memory before backtracking and turning off again.

At last, she stopped. ‘I’m pretty sure this is the place. Rue de l’Église, number fifteen. I can’t for the life of me remember the apartment number, though.’

We stood there in the sunshine for a moment, looking up at a series of tiny wrought-iron balconies, many with geraniums spilling from window boxes or pots of herbs spreading their leaves in the morning sun. The impetus that had carried me so far abruptly faded away.

What were we doing here? The idea that I’d somehow be vindicated by catching Zara out in a lie seemed absurd now that the prospect of it happening was real. And, of course, if I was wrong and it turned out Zara’s illness was not a fabrication – well, I’d feel every bit as terrible as I deserved to.

On the wall outside the building was a panel of bells next to a metal fretwork security gate. We stood for a moment, looking at them.

‘I don’t think this is—’ I began.

‘Shall we—’ Rowan said at the same time.

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