Showing that although she complained about living in a goldfish bowl, she was not altogether immune from its behaviour, Mrs Grieve said:

‘Barbara said you’d come back without luggage.’

‘Most of my things,’ said Miss Mayfield truthfully, ‘are in a trunk which was here when I arrived.’

Mrs Grieve made one last effort to detain her.

‘You know, I don’t think you are fit to be alone yet. Why don’t you move in with us? There’s plenty of room. I should be delighted to have you.’

‘That is more than kind. But honestly I’m much stronger than I look. And I have been looking forward to sleeping in my own bed again.’

‘Come and have lunch with us tomorrow, then. Or with me, I should say. Barbara will probably be out. I hate eating alone. I have an open invitation to the Rectory, but – and I know I shouldn’t say this – I find poor Isabel absolutely exasperating. After half an hour I long to shake her. I suppose you’re much more kind hearted and feel sorry for her?’

‘Perhaps I do, in a way,’ Miss Mayfield said cautiously.

The feeling which had afflicted her in the shop – that she must confess and beg for enlightenment or go mad if she didn’t soon escape – came upon her again.

Heavy purple clouds had reared themselves in the western sky and everywhere lay in the heavy hush which precedes the first mutter of thunder. After Mrs Grieve’s house her own seemed almost dark. She left the front door wide open, went through into the kitchen where the cat waited, and poured the milk into a saucer. While the cat lapped daintily, she went upstairs and folded the dust sheets in the bedroom, found, in the bathroom, an airing cupboard well stocked with bed linen and made up her bed.

When she came down again, she stood for a moment looking at the trunk and the crate. She knew that, having come so far and with such difficulty in order to look for some trace of her past, she was now, in a feeble fashion, reluctant to take the final step. The day had been a series of disappointments, and for a moment she doubted her strength to face yet another. Nevertheless, she went into the kitchen and found a sharp knife, a claw hammer and a solid-looking screwdriver.

From the front door she could see the garden bathed in a strange olive-green light; the topiary birds in the hedge looked as though they had been cut from black stone.