“It’s like evening in the country,” he said. “Birds singing and water. We’re sitting on a bank by the river now.”

“Having a picnic.”

“And then we’re going to take our clothes off and have a swim. Gee, it’ll be cold. You’ll be able to feel all the fish swimming about.”

“I can hear the 47 bus, too,” she said. “People are going home to tea. It’s cold without any clothes on, isn’t it? Feel my arm, it’s like snow, only not so white. Pale hands I love,” she began to sing. “Do you love me altogether?”

“I don’t know. I don’t think I feel anything like that at all. I never do feel much until afterwards and then it’s too late.”

“Now it isn’t too late. It isn’t too late Sam. We’re alone. Polly and Sam. I’ll come and have a swim with you if you like. In the dirty old river with the duck.”

“Don’t you ever smile, Polly? I haven’t seen you smile once.”

“You’ve only known me for twenty minutes. I don’t like smiling much, I think I look best when I’m very serious, like this.” She saddened her eyes and mouth. “I’m a tragedienne. I’m crying because my lover’s dead.”

Slowly tears came to her eyes.

“His name was Sam and he had green eyes and brown hair. He was ever so short. Darling, darling, darling Sam, he’s dead.” The tears ran down her cheeks.

“Stop crying now, Polly. Please. Stop crying. You’ll hurt yourself.”

But she was crying pitifully.

“Stop it, Polly, pretty Polly.” He put his arm around her shoulders. He kissed her on the cheek. It was warm and wet. “Nobody’s dead, Polly darling,” he said. She cried and moaned his name in the abandon of her made grief, tore at the loose low neck of her dress, threw back her hair and raised her damp eyes to the birds in their cages and the cracked heavens of the ceiling.

“You’re doing it fine,” he said in despair, shaking her shoulders. “I’ve never seen such fine crying. Stop now, please, Polly, please, while you can stop.”

Ninety-eight per cent of the human body is water, he thought. Polly Dacey is all salt water. She sat by his side like a flood in an apron.

“I’ll do anything you like if you’ll only stop,” he said. “You’ll drown yourself, Polly. I’ll promise to do anything in the world.”

She dried her eyes on her bare arm.

“I wasn’t really breaking my heart, silly. I was only depicting. What’ll you do, then? Anything? I can depict being glad because my lover’s not really dead, too. The War Office made a mistake.”

“Anything,” he said. “I want to see you being glad tomorrow. You musn’t do one after the other.”

“It’s nothing to me, I can do them all in a row. I can do childbirth and being tight and—”

“You do being quiet. Do being a quiet lady sitting on a bath, Polly.”