There was the merest hesitation before the word “home.”

“Perhaps you should call in and collect them sometime. I’m sure Howard wouldn’t mind. They’re no use to him.”

“Oh well, you know.” Gretchen shook her head. “Let’s have tea.”

She went into the kitchen and Jean could hear her clattering about over the gathering shriek of the kettle. When she returned, carrying two chunky pottery mugs and a plate of spitzbuben on a tray, Jean noticed for the first time that she was moving stiffly and that her wrists were bandaged with the same leather splints that Martha wore.

“Are you all right?” she asked, jumping up to help. “You look as if you’re in pain.”

“My joints are a bit tender at the moment,” she confessed, turning her hands over and back. “I don’t know why. Maybe it’s the cold.” She pointed to a patch of the green marbled wallpaper that was bubbly with damp.

“Is there no way of making it warmer? A kerosene heater or something . . .”

“We have an electric fire, but it’s too expensive to use during the day. We put it on for an hour in the evening, but there are so many gaps and drafts in here the heat flies straight out of the windows.”

They were settled on the couch now, with the eiderdown over their legs and mugs of tea warming their hands, and it was almost cozy.

“Are you short of money? I’m sure Howard wouldn’t want to think of you like this.”

“He already sends me a money order every week. But Martha doesn’t like accepting money from Howard. She wants to support me herself.”

Jean glanced around. It looked as though she was struggling to support herself before Gretchen even appeared on the scene.

“She works so hard. She’s started an evening job too, taking life drawing classes in a church hall in Battersea, but it makes it even harder to paint when she’s tired and in pain. I wish I could do my dressmaking to help out, but there’s no room here for all my things.”

“Perhaps you’ll be able to find somewhere larger?”

“I don’t know.” She passed Jean a cookie. “These are nice, aren’t they? I can still cook!”

“I suppose,” said Jean, “we should talk about the Echo and our plans for the story. Dr. Lloyd-Jones said you were disappointed about the skin grafts. It was a blow.”

“I don’t understand it. I’m not a scientist.” She shrugged. “I said they could do another graft until it works, but they wouldn’t. All it has proved is that their test was no good. Now, Martha is starting to doubt me again and I suppose you do, too.”

“Gretchen, I would have loved to prove your case. Or even to find an alternative explanation. But I haven’t been able to do either and I feel that as a failure of mine, not yours. We still want to run the story in some form. As an unexplained mystery.”