“It’s not wet out,” said Stephanie, watching him struggle into the boots, which were stiff from disuse. “Still, they’re warmer, I suppose. They’re like what my uncle wears—the one on the farm.”

“Are you going down tomorrow?” he asked.

“Straight from work.”

“Then you’ll have all your packing to do tonight,” he said.

“Oh no,” she said. “My parents are going on ahead in the car. Mummy takes all my things for me.”

“The car,” he said, remembering that he was supposed to be making for his own. “Do you mind coming down the fire escape and across the garden? It’s rather dark, but much quicker, and as you say, it’s not wet—”

“That’s fine,” she assured him.

He picked up his torch and switched it on. They went out, down the iron stairs, across the grass hardened into the likeness of an unmade road by the severe cold. The wind skewered their arms to their sides.

“You’re going by train tomorrow?” asked Brett, opening the back door into the garage.

“Yes. The Man of Kent. So’s Mr. Majendie.”

“He doesn’t drive?” Brett held the door of the car for her.

“Not all the way. He keeps his car in a lock-up at Folkestone and just takes it to and from his house. He told me all this the other morning. You know.”

“When he asked you to come and see the collection,” called Brett from the front of the garage.

“Do you see anything funny in that?” she asked haughtily, as he came and sat beside her.

“No, not at all,” he lied.

“Oh. Good. Neither did Geoffrey. Daddy laughed for hours.”

“So Geoffrey doesn’t have it all his own way in the lunch-hour conversation!”

She tossed her head, causing the switch of hair to flick from side to side. Brett drove forward.

“I never thought I’d actually sit in this car,” she said.

“You mean in a car of this kind?”

“No,” she cried indignantly. “In this actual one.”

“How did you know that I had a car?”

“I’ve seen you in it.” She sounded surprised that he hadn’t understood the obvious. “I noticed you first one day last summer. You drove down Fitch Street and went into the private recording studio. I’ve often seen you since. Sometimes you go in Kellett’s, too. This is a new car, isn’t it, though it’s the same make and colour as the other. I noticed the different number plates.”

“I see.”

“No,” she said blithely, “I did the seeing—from my little garden. The bomb site, I mean, the one next door. It’s lovely and warm and sunny, and there’s a lot of that pink flower—well, it’s a weed really, but it’s very pretty.”

“Rose-bay Willow-herb. Did you know a florist’s used to stand there?”