She might have knelt there in the wet grass for much longer if a gentle drift of rain had not dimmed the three steel stars. With a nervous movement of her hands she thrust down the lid of the box and pulled the wrapping paper over it. Still she knelt before it, haloed in mist, bewildered, her hands pressed upon the parcel. Simon came upon her there. She turned and looked at him with a glance halfradiant, half-incredulous.

‘It’s not meant for me,’ she said.

He asked what was in the parcel. By this time she had taken off her mackintosh and wrapped the box in it. ‘A black dress,’ she said. ‘With three stars on it. Other things, underneath. Another box. I didn’t look past the dress. It’s not meant for me.’

‘Aunt Wynne.’

‘It’s not one of Aunt Wynne’s dresses. It’s new. It came from Auckland. There must be another Barbara Claire.’

‘You’re nuts,’ said Simon. ‘I suppose she’s sent the money or something. Why the heck have you taken your mac off? You’ll get wet.’

Barbara rose to her feet clutching the enormous package. ‘It’s got my name on it. Barbara Claire, Wai-ata-tapu Spa, via Harpoon. There’s an envelope inside, too, with my name on it.’

‘What was in it?’

‘I didn’t look.’

‘You’re dopey.’

‘It can’t be for me.’

‘Gee whiz, you’re mad. Here, what about the bread and the rest of the mail?’

‘I didn’t look.’

‘Aw, hell, you’re mad as a meat axe.’ Simon opened the letter box. ‘There’s a postcard from Uncle James. He’s coming back tonight. A telegram for Mum from Auckland. That’s funny. And a whole swag for the boarders. Yes, and look at the bread kicking around in the dirt. No trouble to you. Wait on.’

But Barbara, clutching the parcel, was running down the hill in the rain.

Gaunt waited on the verandah in his dressing-gown; ‘very dark and magnificent,’ thought Dikon maliciously. Whatever the fate of the dress, whatever Barbara’s subsequent reaction, Gaunt had his reward, Dikon thought, when she ran across the pumice and laid the parcel on the verandah table, calling her mother.

‘Hullo,’ said Gaunt. ‘Had a birthday?’

‘No. It’s something that’s happened. I can’t understand it.’ She was unwrapping the mackintosh from the parcel. Her hands, stained with housework but not yet thickened, shook a little. She unfolded the wrapping paper.

‘Is it china that you handle it so gingerly?’

‘No. It’s—my hands!’ She ran down the verandah to the bathroom. Simon came slowly across the pumice with the bread and walked through the house.

‘Did you tell them what to write?’ Gaunt asked Dikon.

‘Yes.’

Barbara returned, shouting for her mother. Mrs Claire and the Colonel appeared looking as if they anticipated some new catastrophe.