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By Root 2366 0

them like those interminable rovings pursued in dreams. Cutting through several side turnings, I at last found myself among a conjunction of dark red brick Renaissance-type houses. In one of these the Jeavonses had lived for twenty years or more, an odd centre of miscellaneous hospitality to which Chips Lovell himself had first taken me. In the lower reaches of their street, two fire-engines were drawn up. By the light of electric torches, firemen and air-raid wardens were passing in and out of one of the front-doors. This particular house turned out to be the Jeavonses’. In the dark, little was to be seen of what was happening. Apart from these dim figures going to and fro, like the trolls in Peer Gynt, nothing seemed abnormal about the façade. There was no sign of damage to the structure. One of the wardens, in helmet and overalls, stopped by the steps and lit a cigarette.

“Did this house get it?”

“About an hour ago,” he said, “that last tip-and-run raider.”

“Anybody hurt?”

He took the cigarette from his mouth and nodded.

“I know the people – are they about?”

“You know Mr. Jeavons and Lady Molly?”

“Yes.”

“You’ve only just arrived here?”

“That’s it.”

“Mr. Jeavons and me are on the same warden-post,” he said. “They’ve taken him down there. Giving him a cup of tea.”

“Was he injured?”

“It was her.”

“Badly?”

The warden looked at me as if I should not have asked that question.

“You hadn’t heard?” he said.

“No.”

“Didn’t survive.”

He went on speaking at once, as if from a kind of embarrassment at having to announce such a thing.

“She and the young lady,” he said. “It was all at the back of the house. You wouldn’t think there was a jot of damage out here in front, but there’s plenty inside, I can tell you. Dreadful thing. Used to see a lot of them. Always very friendly people. Got their newspapers from me, matter of fact. If you know them, there’s a lady inside can tell you all about it.”

“I’ll go in.”

He threw away the stub of his cigarette and trod on it

“So long,” he said.

“So long.”

He was right about there being a mess inside. A woman m some sort of uniform was giving instructions to the People clearing up. She turned out to be Eleanor Walpole-Wilson.

“Eleanor.”

She looked round.

“Hallo, Nick,” she said. “Thank goodness you’ve come.”

She did not seem at all surprised to see me. She came across the hall. Now in her middle thirties, Eleanor was less unusual in appearance than as a girl. No doubt uniform suited her. Though her size and shape had also become more conventional, she retained an air of having been never properly assimilated to either sex. At the same time, big and broad-shouldered, she was not exactly a “mannish” woman. Her existence might have been more viable had that been so.

“You’ve heard what’s happened?” she said abruptly.

Her manner, too, so out of place in ordinary social relations, had equally come into its own.

“Molly’s …”

“And Priscilla.”

“God.”

“One of the Polish officers too – the nice one. The other’s pretty well all right, just a bang over the head. That wretched girl who got into trouble with the Norwegian has been taken to hospital. She’ll be all right, too, when she’s recovered from the shock, I don’t know whether she’ll keep the baby.”

It was clear all this briskness was specifically designed to carry Eleanor through. She must have been having a very bad time indeed.

“A man at the door – one of the wardens – said Ted was down at the post.”

“He was there when it happened. They may have taken him on to the hospital by now. How did you hear about it? I didn’t know you were in London.”

“I’m passing through on leave.”

“Is Isobel all right?”

“She’s all right. She’s in the country.”

Just for the moment I felt unable to explain anything very lucidly, to break through the barricade of immediate action and rapid talk with which Eleanor was protecting herself. It was like trying to tackle her in the old days, when she had been training one of her dogs with a whistle, and would not listen to other people round her. She must have developed early in life this effective