When Charles Bannister said that he would not overdo things, he had been completely sincere: he had meant, of course, that he would be careful not to move too fast, not that there was any sort of ceiling to his ambitions. Mrs Bannister should have known this: indeed, in her more sober and reflective moments, she did know it; but at the beginning, secure and ecstatic in an Indian summer of love which, at the age of forty-six, she thought she could no longer attain, she was caught off her guard – and after that it was too late.

Charles Bannister was a skilful lover: it was the sort of thing he had been paid to be, for very many years; and in the present case he applied his skill long enough to establish himself firmly in the saddle. Once there, once Mrs Bannister was committed to his plans for a bigger and better Esther Costello, there was no retrieving the situation.

Whenever she protested, in the early days, against some particular extravagance, he threatened – though always elegantly – to withdraw his favours. Soon there was no use in her protesting anyway, since the machine had started turning and could not be stopped; and presently there were no favours to withdraw, because the Indian summer had burnt itself out, and would never return.

But to begin with, she had no great suspicion in her mind that Charles Bannister would overstep the mark: chance had rescued him from penury, and it seemed he must realize that Esther Costello could give them both a substantial living, without too gross an effort on his part. In fact, against all the odds she continued to trust him … Even when he was first introduced to Esther, and, surveying her admiringly, had said: “She’s a damned attractive girl – wish I were a few years younger!” Mrs Bannister had not got beyond thinking: ‘Oh no – he wouldn’t do that …’ Embalmed in unexpected love, she had forgotten how many times she had used these precise words in the past, and how many times the outcome had astonished and shamed her.

There were plenty of ghosts for her to call on, if she cared to, a whole gallery of hideous memories; but she was blind to them at the beginning, and by the time she awoke to reality, reality had won itself too long a start.

First, said Charles, when they were at the planning stage, first there was some ground to be cleared.

“We must definitely fix the parents,” he told her. “The mother’s a stupid peasant, the father’s a drunk; but they have got a nuisance value. We don’t want some crooked Irish lawyer ferreting about, later on … We’d better adopt the girl, formally.”

“Will they agree to that?” she asked.

He shrugged. “It’s bound to cost a bit … But I know a man in Dublin who can fix it up for us. He’ll talk them into accepting a small pension, in return for giving up all rights to the girl. We can’t afford any mistakes, once we get properly underway.”