Tears threatened again. Blinking, groping for her handkerchief, Ethel ducked her head and pressed against Miss Mayfield’s injured shoulder. She was aware of the flinch and the recoil, and straightened up, resuming that unchildlike self-control which was – Miss Mayfield realized – the very core of her character.

‘You’re hurt,’ she said. ‘They’ve done something to you again.’

‘No. I was clumsy in the dark and hurt my shoulder. They can do nothing to me.’

‘Don’t you be too sure! My gran’d do you a damage as soon as look at you. The things she done to me . . . but then you do know some, though you let her fool you.’

‘You helped her to, Ethel. All this might have been avoided if only you’d trusted me.’

‘I didn’t dare. There was Sydney; and then there was my dear little owd rabbits. . . .’ A strong convulsive shudder ran through her. ‘And that done it. I said to her, “There, now, I’m through with you.” And I walked out.’

‘I can’t tell you how worried I was. Where were you, Ethel?’

‘Up at the Rectory. The funny thing is . . . Miss, did you ever hev a dream and afterwards you could remember some parts and not others? Well, thass how it was. I walked down Curlew Lane, thinking I’d cut through Mr Tharkell’s and back on to the road, and there was Miss Thorby. Of course, I was howling my head off; I was fond of them rabbits, but I didn’t want her stopping and asking what I was howling about, so I bent down and made out I was getting their feeding stuff; and that was a daft thing to do, because it set me off worse than ever. So she did stop and she did ask, and before I knew where I was, I was telling her everything. Then there’s a bit thass all blurry. Next I knew, I was up at the Rectory. She said my gran’d never find me there. Nor she never . . . at least, not found.’ Ethel broke off and scowled. ‘Miss Thorby and me spent a lot of time playing daft games.’

‘What kind of games?’

‘Seeing which of us could look into a bit of looking-glass longest without blinking. Or sometimes it’d be a puddle of ink. Or even staring one another out. I sort of got tired and went to sleep mostly and then everything’d go blurry again. I was always in a muddle with the time, too; it’d be tea-time in the middle of the morning.’

‘You were hypnotized, Ethel. Miss Thorby is a hypnotist.’