Charles Polkinghorn recoiled. Almost mown by the wind the machine made in passing, he kept his balance with difficulty. Once, he remembered to have read, a blade had become detached and embedded itself in a human eye.

But a certain minutia of evil had been dispersed simply by the opening of an envelope. His hands faltered in search of increased relief. To do his duty. If it was not – for he could not claim to be noble – to save his own skin.

He had opened, again, at last.

... otherwise [the next threat ran] your supply may be disconnected without further warning....

So that his neck was straining, his eyes grew polypous, his veins shrank until it seemed they might fail altogether to convey the flow.

Then Charles Polkinghorn remembered his godmother. Auntie Maud, he was convinced, must save. If his swollen tongue had not choked him before he tore the envelope.

My dear Charles, [it was herself speaking]

This is just a note to wish you the happiest of birthdays. I am truly disappointed not to be with you on the occasion. But the doctor forbids me to attempt it since my ’turn’.

Dear Charles, I want you to know what very great happiness you have given me, almost as though you were my own son. I have been an unsatisfactory godmother, I admit, what with the actual distance that has always separated us – and, well, just my own inadequacy. My only consolation is a belief that it is not possible to discuss things of the spirit without their losing something of their purity. Will you, too, my dear, console yourself in realizing this? I have always liked to think we have brought each other comfort of a kind.

Now, Charles, I must take you into my confidence – that is to say: I do not wish to upset your mother – but there is every possibility that I may not last so very much longer. The truth is always a risk, but at some points one has to risk it. I asked, and I was told. In the meantime, I shall pray that I remain with you, always, always, in the spirit.

I am sending you a little package for your birthday. If it should arrive beforehand, I ask you to keep it until the day for which it is intended.

Your loving godmother -

MAUD BLES

Then Charles Polkinghorn had to cry out. Blessés! The two -or was it the three of them?

But was not Auntie Maud aware that packages contain the worst of dangers, threatening the lives of politicians, diplomats, film stars, all people of importance? At least the package had not arrived. Or had they put it away, and forgotten it was thriving and throbbing in the dark of some unvisited cupboard?

He began to go round the room. The windows were open. Through them he suddenly heard the approach of animals above the gibbering of Norman’s mower. The soft, but insidious animals. Or rain? It was the first enormous drops of rain padding through the mulberry leaves. None the less, he closed the windows.