‘You must have been thinking,’ said Sydney. ‘It’s really too bad of you.’ With animation she waved Ronald forward and Ronald, coming up after her, made a benevolent third till they came to a point where a parting of ways became possible. Here he nodded goodbye and made off by a steep track that doubled back up the side of the hill. Going up he whistled, turned once or twice to stare out over their heads at the sea, and showed plainly that he had forgotten or at least was no longer concerned with them. It was Milton, not Sydney, who kept looking after him rather uncertainly as though he had half a mind to call him back, until Ronald disappeared into a fold of the hill. Too light-heartedly Ronald had shaken them off.

‘Do let’s not think about Ronald,’ Sydney said, recalling him with a sigh. ‘I should like us just to be together.’

‘But, my dear …’

‘Aren’t we happy?’ she rather fiercely exclaimed.

He nodded. ‘And you know,’ he said, and pressed her arm gently, ‘that silences me.’

‘I can’t see anything to be silent about,’ said she, and smiled crookedly. ‘Kiss me!’

‘How horribly quiet it is,’ she said, still with a hand on his arm, as he let her go again. ‘Don’t remind me I came here: I won’t ever again – an experiment’s failed. James, I won’t let you be happy if you mean to surround me with silences – sinister silences that bulge like a bubble and never quite burst.’

He laughed. ‘You don’t like the ineffable.’

‘Nothing’s ineffable.’

‘You are.’

‘No, I’m not. I am not elemental and dumb. If you like I’ll explain myself perfectly. Now be practical: talk about plans. Have you written those letters?’

‘I wrote them this morning.’

‘That is splendid. I do want to feel we’ve some sort of attachment outside this improbable place. I wrote last night and slipped down last thing, when the lounge was quite empty, to put them into the concierge’s box. It was locked, so I couldn’t take them out again, and I went to bed hugging myself. When did you post yours?’

‘I haven’t posted them yet,’ he said ruefully.