‘Never mind. Rise above. Watch me: I’m a past master at it. Gird up the loins, dear, such as they are, and remember you’re an actress.’ He giggled. ‘Looked at in the right way it’ll be rather fun.’

‘What shall I wear?’

‘Black, and no jewellery. She’ll be clanking.’

‘I hate being at enmity, Bertie. What a beastly profession ours is. In some ways.’

‘It’s a jungle, darling. Face it – it’s a jungle.’

‘You,’ Pinky said rather enviously, ‘don’t seem to be unduly perturbed, I must say.’

‘My poorest girl, little do you know. I’m quaking.’

‘Really? But could she actually do you any damage?’

‘Can the boa-constrictor,’ Bertie said, ‘consume the rabbit?’

Pinky had thought it better not to press this matter any further. They had separated and gone to their several flats, where in due course they made ready for the party.

Anelida and Octavius also made ready. Octavius, having settled for a black coat, striped trousers and the complementary details that he considered appropriate to these garments, had taken up a good deal of his niece’s attention. She had managed to have a bath and was about to dress when, for the fourth time, he tapped at her door and presented himself before her, looking anxious and unnaturally tidy. ‘My hair,’ he said. ‘Having no unguent, I used a little olive oil. Do I smell like a salad?’

She reassured him, gave his coat a brush and begged him to wait for her in the shop. He had old-fashioned ideas about punctuality and had begun to fret. ‘It’s five-and-twenty minutes to seven. We were asked for half-past six, Nelly.’

‘That means seven at the earliest, darling. Just take a furtive leer through the window and you’ll see when people begin to come. And please, Unk, we can’t go while I’m still in my dressing-gown, can we, now?’

‘No, no, of course not. Half-past six for a quarter-to-seven? Or seven? I see. I see. In that case …’

He pottered downstairs.

Anelida thought: ‘It’s a good thing I’ve had some practice in quick changes.’ She did her face and hair, and she put on a white dress that had been her one extravagance of the year, a large white hat with a black velvet crown, and new gloves. She looked in the glass, forcing herself to adopt the examining attitude she used in the theatre. ‘And it might as well be a first night,’ she thought, ‘the way I’m feeling.’ Did Richard like white? she wondered.