Her anger had been out of proportion, and now in retrospect it puzzled her. It was as if she was protecting herself with it, but that cast Tom in the role of the marauder, and he was far too subtle for that.

On the two or three occasions since when they had met at Follies House, Helen had caught herself staring covertly at him. She felt how well she knew the decisive lines of his face, and then she saw afresh the amusement that lurked around his mouth. She thought his amusement masked the calm assumption that she would apologise, and his determination not to make the overture himself. Annoyance would well up inside her and she would turn away, more stony-faced than she had intended.

The breach was not healed, and though she told herself it didn’t, it mattered to her more than she dared to admit. It mattered, because in spite of her resolution to avoid him, her eyes raked the crowded streets for his dark head, and she listened for his voice in the clamour that rose from Pansy’s room.

Helen’s floor was shaking with the vibrations of the music now. She sighed and pressed her fingers against her forehead, staring at the words in front of her.

There was yet another reason for staying away from Pansy’s party, although if this noise went on she might as well go and join in. There was very little time left between now and the Final Schools in June. Helen fought the panicky feeling that she was behind with her work. So much had happened. Her father. Oliver. Her mother’s job, and her own fear of having to leave Oxford. Then Oliver’s wonderfully tactful present. Helen sighed. There was that; he had done that, even if he refused to let her acknowledge it.

So much had happened, and now it was over. Now she must work to make up for lost time. Helen read on, her shoulders hunched as if to cut herself off from the din downstairs.

When someone knocked at her door, she frowned quickly before calling, automatically, ‘Come in.’

Then she turned round in her chair to see Darcy.

‘The downstairs door was open,’ he said mildly. ‘People were teeming in and out.’

‘To see Pansy Warren,’ she smiled back at him.

‘Oliver’s girl?’

‘The same.’

‘Ah.’ Darcy wandered in and began picking up books, examining the titles with an expression of bafflement before putting them carefully back in their places again. ‘She looks like a picture in one of the glossy mags. Just about as much substance, too. You don’t mind, then?’

Helen reflected that her visitor didn’t look much like a Viscount. His clothes were shabby and definitely muddy around the edges, and his colourless hair needed cutting. His homely face was anxious, with none of Oliver’s hauteur showing in it.