'One of the last century's greatest woman writers' GuardianIt is London in the late 1930s and sixteen-year-old orphan Portia is plunged into the sophisticated and politely treacherous world of her wealthy half-brother's home . Wide-eyed and disconcertingly vulnerable, Portia encounters the attractive, carefree cad Eddie. To him, Portia is at once child and woman, and he fears her gushing love. To her, Eddie is the only reaason to be alive. But when Eddie follows Portia to a sea-side resort, the flash of a cigarette lighter in a darkened cinema illuminates a stunning romantic betrayal--and sets in motion one of the most moving and desperate flights of the heart in modern literature.