Every morning she was up at five, at her desk half an hour later chewing on a cereal bar and digesting the overnight news stories. At eight she met with Blanchard and the rest of the bid team, then straight on to twelve hours of meetings, conference calls, emails and spreadsheets. Every night at nine a taxi came to ferry her to the hospital, where she’d spend an hour at her mother’s bedside: at least, having gone private, there were no restrictions on visiting hours. Then another taxi home, poring over the messages coming in on her phone, and perhaps a final hour’s work before two or three in the morning. She lived in darkness, a world of constant night where she never seemed to sleep. She began walking to the office again, even when it rained, just for ten minutes in the open air. Soon she came to recognise the people who were up at that hour: the streetsweeper on the corner of Gresham Street, making the world new again; the newspaper delivery driver who honked as he drove past; the newsagent lifting the shutter on his shop who never looked at her.
