27 AUGUST 1988, Page 24

Cretan Rug

Why couldn't she say she didn't like the red rug with its black pattern of jars and lamps he bought in the tourist shop? (To love him didn't mean she had to love his rug.) And now that she'd hung it the wrong way up on the wall — so all the oil (if there was any oil) would have spilled on the floor like luck running out of an upside-down horseshoe — why was she so afraid?

As if love really was a flame and she'd just tipped away every last drop of their winter's fuel.

Vicki Feaver