Free The Song Before It Is Sung by Justin Cartwright

gleaming specks. His mind, moving a little too fast, like a man running down a mountain, skips
     to the Klondike and men in shabby clothes standing in icy streams staring hopefully at sieves.
    He has no plastic bags, but the bakers below give him some used flour bags and offer him the use of their dumpster. He buys
     a freshly baked ciabatta, lightly dusted with flour, and takes it upstairs with the bags. As he cleans he leaves a light talc
     everywhere. He wonders how he could have used so many toilet rolls in so short a time. He carries the stuff downstairs; Tony
     Baiocchi and one of his sons, who wears a diamond ear stud, help him throw the flour bags into the dumpster.
    'Where's your lovely missus the doctor, then? We ain't seen her for a little while.'
    'We've split up, Tony.'
    'That's a crying shame. She's a lovely gel. I thought you was perfect together.'
    Upstairs he takes a look at himself in the bathroom mirror. He wonders if he is looking haggard and eccentric, but actually
     he quite likes the way he looks, a little dishevelled, but interesting; small pouches have formed under his eyes. He has not
     taken much note recently of the time; he feels no need to go to bed at any particular hour, or to get up if he doesn't feel
     like it. This irregularity has led to these eye-pouches. Perfect together. They were never perfect together. But he sees again the sense that other people have that Francine is something special, a
     lovely gel, who lent him some lustre. The world doesn't give much value to high-minded thinking.
    Successfully completing manual tasks always leaves him invigorated and he sits down among the cardboard boxes with renewed
     purpose. Just then the phone rings and he hears a woman's voice, clear but delivered at elderly registers.
    'I would like to speak to Mr Senior.'
    'Yes, that's me.'
    'You won't know who I am, but I am Elizabeth Partridge. The novelist, Rosamund Bower, was my cousin.'
    'Good God. Sorry. Apologies.'
    'You probably imagined I was dead.'
    'No, no, not at all, I just had no idea what had happened to you. Although of course I knew that Miss Bower died in 1984.
     And I have some of your letters.'
    'Yes, I know that Elya Mendel gave you many of his papers. I have some of his letters as well as some letters from Axel von
     Gottberg, and I wondered if you would like to have them. Elya suggested it before he died.'
    'Jesus Christ. Sorry again. Yes, please, I would love to see them.'
    'I'm in Ireland, but I will be in London next week for an operation.'
    She speaks, as clearly and as harshly as a bell, with the authority of someone who has been around servants and dogs and horses
     all her life.
    'Did Mr Mendel write to you often?'
    'Oh yes. He certainly did. We were terribly close, particularly after Rosamund chucked him. Axel wrote to me often. I also
     have some of Rosamund's letters from Axel. Are you married?'
    'I am, but it's not going well. She's gone.'
    'It's a mistake to think of marriage as the final solution. Your voice is slightly odd. I hear that's how the young speak
     today. Is that what's called Estuary English?'
    'Probably. I hope your operation is not serious.'
    'At my age everything is serious. But this is just plumbing. Do you know, I never took it seriously when people said growing
     old is awful. But the truth is that it is awful. Things conk out.'
    'I've got a lot of questions for you.'
    'I'll do my best. Fortunately, my brain seems to be holding up surprisingly well.'
    'How many letters do you have?'
    'At least a hundred.'
    'Good God.'
    'You seem to have a rather limited vocabulary. In those days one wrote. Goodbye.'
    'When are we going to meet?'
    'I will telephone you when I arrive at Basil Street.'
    He thinks when she has gone that she probably slept with von Gottberg. He finds it quite shocking, even thrilling, that someone
     who knew them both so well is still alive. From her letters, he has come to know her, but it never occurred to him that she
     would still be