“You’re flaked out,” he said. “I’ll run you home.” His voice had suddenly lost its aggressiveness, and he seemed to have for­gotten about my still untouched pony glass.

On the way home we didn’t talk; but he seemed curiously pleased about something. I guessed what had made him happy, what now and again brought him to the verge of a chuckle; I felt myself warming to him. He got out of the car and went to the garden gate with me. I saw to my relief that the house was dark. I was home and I knew that the aubretia and the morning glory had come out. I recognised them now only by their location; tomorrow I should see them opened out, blue and pink and lavender and crimson.

“Come in for a drink,” I said to George.

“It’s too late,” he said. “Thanks just the same.”

“Bring Maureen here some time,” I said, as he was getting back in the car.

“I’d love to,” he said. “Goodnight, Joe.”

The car door slammed. It was a solid railway carriage slam; George had a Mercedes now. I watched him till he went out of sight then opened the front door. I didn’t go in immediately; I turned and had a last look out. Everything had been settled now, I thought, there was no pain left. Warley had stayed the same, Warley had won in the end, George would give his wife child­ren and the dead would rest. I went indoors, closing the door softly, and opened my briefcase to look for the colour film and the panda.

6

6

“Use the record-player if you like, Gerda.”

“Thank you, Mr. Lampton.”

She bobbed her head as if to begin a curtsey. She looked very plump and blonde and submissive; I wondered, not for the first time, how she would react if I made a really determined pass. How did one begin? You’ve been a good girl, a very good girl; then a pat on the rosy cheek. I’ve a little present for you – but I hadn’t a little present for her, and I didn’t mess about with the servants. Not that she was a servant; her father was a customer of ours and she’d come over to learn the language. So she was one of the family. There weren’t any servants now; I’d been born too late.

“In Hamburg now we shall all be out of doors,” Gerda said. “We shall dance out of doors also.”

“We haven’t the facilities here,” I said. “But there’s a flannel dance tonight.”

She wrinkled her nose. “You dance in flannel?”

“You can wear summer clothes.” I looked over her shoulder at the mural. The Venetian blinds were half closed and the kitchen was full of shadows; there were lines on the drawings which I hadn’t noticed before.