Dusk drew on and the friends of the missing went back to their respective houses, for there was no good in standing about in this dreadful cold fog which had now crept up from the marsh. Pneumonia wouldn’t help matters. Four of them, Georgie and Major Benjy and Diva and quaint Irene, lived solitary and celibate, and the prospect of a lonely evening with only suspense and faint hopes to feed upon was perfectly ghastly. In consequence, when each of them in turn was rung up by Mr Wyse, who hoped, in a broken voice, that he might find them disengaged and willing to come round to his house for supper (not dinner), they all gladly accepted. Mr Wyse requested them not to dress as for dinner, and this was felt to show a great delicacy: not dressing would be a sort of symbol of their common anxiety. Supper would be at half-past eight, and Mr Wyse trusted that there would be encouraging news before that hour.

The Padre and Mrs Bartlett had been bidden as well, so that there was a supper party of eight. Supper began with the most delicious caviare, and on the black oak mantelpiece were two threepenny Christmas cards. Susan helped herself plentifully to the caviare. There was no use in not eating.

‘Dear Lucia’s Christmas present to me,’ she said. ‘Hers and yours I should say, Mr Georgie.’

‘Lucia sent me a wonderful box of nougat chocolates,’ said Diva. ‘She and you, I mean, Mr Georgie.’

Major Benjy audibly gulped.

‘Mrs Lucia,’ he said, ‘if I may call her so, sent me half a dozen bottles of pre-war whisky.’

The Padre had pulled himself together by this time, and spoke Scotch.

‘I had a wee mischance wi’ my umbrella two days agone,’ he said, ‘and Mistress Lucia, such a menseful woman, sent me a new one. An’ now that’s gone bobbin’ out to sea.’

‘You’re too pessimistic, Kenneth,’ said Mrs Bartlett. ‘An umbrella soon gets waterlogged and sinks, I tell you. The chances are it will be picked up in the marsh tomorrow, and it’ll find its way back to you, for there’s that beautiful silver band on the handle with your name engraved on it.’

‘Eh, ’twould be a bonnie thing to recover it,’ said her husband.

Mr Wyse thought that the conversation was getting a little too much concerned with minor matters; the recovery of an umbrella, though new, was a loss that might be lamented later. Besides, the other missing lady had not been mentioned yet. He pointed to the two threepenny Christmas cards on the mantelpiece.

‘Our friend Elizabeth Mapp sent those to my wife and me yesterday,’ he said. ‘We shall keep them always among our most cherished possessions in case – I mean in any case. Pretty designs. Roofs covered with snow. Holly. Robins. She had a very fine artistic taste. Her pictures had always something striking and original about them.’