Quote in script along the side of a thigh

You will want the whole of it, so I'll tell you straight. Mr Dunmore's ballroom above the Co-op on Weir Street smelled of lemon polish and wet coats, and the band played 'Sentimental Journey' twice before the lights came up. I was dancing with the Pole, Tadeusz, who never steps on anyone's toes, when I noticed the little door behind the bandstand standing open a crack. Mother always said curiosity often leads to trouble, and so I went and looked.

Behind it was a stairwell smelling of cigarettes and something sweeter, and at the top a room full of coats and a cardboard box of letters tied with string. They were addressed to Dunmore's wife, who died in March, and not one had been opened. I sat on the top step reading the nearest envelope until my hands shook, because the postmark was last week.

I did not tell anyone. I tied the string back as it was and came down with my hat in my hand, and when Tadeusz asked where I'd been I said powdering my nose. Trouble found me anyway, the way it does. Mr Dunmore, climbing those same steps at closing, found the door ajar and me on the landing with a letter in my lap.

He did not shout. He sat down beside me, took the envelope from my fingers, and said, 'She always did want to know what I was writing.' Then he opened it, and I let him.