Ralph loosens his arm from Harriet’s waist to engage Arthur MacKenzie in further conversation, leaving her with her mother and poor little Mary. Not that Mary is poor, exactly. She is, Isabel has been given to understand, from rather a smart family. The MacKenzies are comfortable enough and live in one of the smaller houses just around the corner – not on the square, but only a little way off it – but Mary has the dowdy and provincial appearance of a woman raised in a northern part of England that Isabel has never visited and never desires to know. She is a quiet woman, not given to expressions of strong opinion – she leaves those to her husband, who has enough for the two of them. She has raised three sons, none of whom was old enough to join the army before the war ended. Indeed, the eldest is still only sixteen. Mary says that he wishes he had been older. Arthur would have been proud to send his son to France and she agrees, in public, that she would have joined him in this sentiment. But privately, she is happier that her boy always looked immature and that, at thirteen, keen to join up, he was told to return to the schoolyard by the laughing recruiting officer. Isabel, for all she despairs of her daughter, is glad that she did not have to send a son to war, although she declares that she would have been honoured to do so, the cause being so just. There had been a boy, their lovely David, but he had died when he was two. The pain of it still tugs at her belly every so often. And then she remembers to thank God that he died in her arms, sweaty and pale and docile, rather than in the cold foreign mud, alone and unmothered. Isabel and Mary have much that might draw them deeply together into friendship, if they could bring themselves to speak openly. Instead, they make the customary light-but-desultory conversation of polite women – the weather being the easiest and safest entrée – before Mary admires Harriet’s gown.

‘I found it in Hartleys, would you believe? I bought it on a whim.’ Harriet swings her hips a little. She knows it is the sort of gown her mother will disapprove of – far too daring in its cut and the sheerness of its fabric. ‘Even Hartleys is following the more modern fashions.’ Hartleys is one of her mother’s favourite stores. She catches Isabel’s eye and decides to moderate her jocularity, changing the subject. ‘I must tell you, Mrs MacKenzie, Mummy and I spent a very happy time with Mrs Spencer the other day. She’s making my wedding gown and I do declare that it’s going to be rather lovely. I shall be quite the most ravishing bride London has ever seen – all thanks to her handiwork.’