Bird in a circle and berry branch on forearms

The frost came early to Haddon Wick this year, and Mr Pryce has been down at the allotment every morning since, cutting back the rowan that was struck by lightning in August. He says the berries will be poor. I told him they are always poor when you look at them too hard.

The stained glass man came on Tuesday to mend the window over the chapel door. He left a little robin of amber glass on the sill, cut flat and faceted so the light breaks along its breast, the sort of thing you would make if you had seen one bird too many and wanted to keep it in one piece. I have set it where the kettle steam can reach it, and in the mornings it throws a small orange circle across the oilcloth like a second sun that has lost its way.

You asked whether I have gone back to the bus depot job. I haven't. Instead I walked out to the old quarry with the dog and cut a sprig of that rowan, three berries still hard and red at the tips. I pressed it between the pages of your atlas, the one with Lisbon on the cover. Mother found it and said it was bad luck to bring the hedgerow indoors before the Harvest Supper. I told her luck was only something you could carry like anything else.

Write soon and tell me whether the city has birds that sing in the daytime. The one on the sill is making me hear them anyway. Your loving sister, Edie.

P.S. The atlas is back on its shelf, but the rowan has stayed in Lisbon.