They were very quiet, and not entirely at ease with each other. Helen was too preoccupied with rehearsing over and over what she wanted to say to Oliver to talk much. Chloe longed to talk about Stephen because she could think of almost nothing else. Since the first night in his rooms, he had taken possession of her. The more she glimpsed the inexorable pleasure in dominating her which lay behind the urbane exterior, the more she needed and wanted him to go on doing it. Her obsession with him grew and grew until she felt it threatening to explode inside her. As she drove out into the country she tried to find some way of talking about him that wouldn’t sound too heavy-handed. But she couldn’t think of a single one, and she sensed some of Helen’s disapproval and disinclination to be involved in her affair.

In the end she said nothing, and concentrated instead on following Stephen’s directions.

Soon they turned in through a pair of stone gateposts with stone eagles perched on them. There was a short, pot-holed drive between some oak trees and then they pulled up in front of a low, pleasant grey house. There were deep windows looking out over the lawn and the walls were laced over with the winter skeleton of a Virginia creeper. A child’s red tricycle lay overturned on the paving in front of the open door. In the line of cars beside Stephen’s mud-splashed Peugeot was the shooting brake that belonged to Tom and, at the end, the shiny nose of Oliver’s Jaguar. Helen’s eyes went to it at once and, as she walked towards the house at Chloe’s side, she had to concentrate hard on keeping her breathing even and regular.

Chloe tapped on the stained-glass panel in the front door, then they peered inside across the black and white tiled hall. Stephen was standing at the bottom of the stairs with his hand on the shiny mahogany newel-post. He was talking to the girls who were playing Celia and Audrey. Beatrice was beside him with a fair, fat child tugging at her hand.

They came across to meet their guests at once. Stephen kissed them both on the cheek. He had never greeted Helen so warmly before, and she hid a little smile at it.

Beatrice held up a big glass jug. ‘Buck’s Fizz?’ she asked.

Although there were grey streaks in her dark cap of hair and a fan of fine wrinkles around her eyes, she looked younger than her husband. She was very slim, almost like a young girl, and her movements were quick and unthinking as she poured their drinks.