He came and sat down beside her.

‘Darling, don’t wallow! I know you get a kick out of it, but I don’t. You enriched your generation, and what can anyone do more than that, I don’t know. It’s an achievement – and how many people achieve anything at all?’

She put out a hand, and he lifted it to his lips and kissed it lightly.

‘Well, what do you want with me?’

‘Oh, just to ask you a question or two.’

His dark eyebrows rose.

‘About?’

‘About that girl Janet.’

‘What about her?’ His eyes still smiled, but she thought they had a wary look. He said, ‘Darling, her life is an open book – there is simply nothing to tell. She is one of those incredible creatures who just go on doing things for other people and not bothering about themselves.’

‘It sounds dull.’

‘She is a great deal too intelligent to be dull.’

‘Well, you have made her sound as if she had all the dull virtues.’

‘I know. But she isn’t dull. You didn’t really think so yourself.’

‘You would say, then, that she was reliable?’

‘Do you see Star having her down here to look after Stella if she wasn’t?’

‘Star isn’t exactly a model of common sense.’

‘No, but she knows Janet. When you’ve grown up with people there isn’t much you don’t know about them.’

‘Would you say she was a good judge of character – Janet, I mean, not Star.’

‘Oh, yes, she looks right through you and out at the other side. At least that is what she has always done with me.’

Adriana’s large dark eyes were fixed upon him. She said with devastating frankness,

‘Why didn’t you marry her?’

‘You had better ask her.’

‘No use – she wouldn’t tell me.’

‘And what makes you think that I will?’

‘Are you going to?’

‘Oh, no, darling.’

She said,

‘You might do worse. All right, go and fetch her in. And tell Meeson we are ready for our coffee.’

When Meeson came in with the tray she had a beaming smile. It was plain that she thought the world of Ninian. He jumped up, put an arm round her, and told her she got better looking every year, to which she replied that so did he – ‘And get along with you, ducks! No good telling the tale to the old uns. They’ve heard it all before, and if they don’t know what it’s worth by now they never will. All the same, I always did say if there’s a dangerous time in a woman’s life, it’s when she’s just about made up her mind she’s been through the wood once too often and come out with the crooked stick.’

‘Gertie, you talk too much,’ said Adriana.

‘When I get a chance I do – stands to reason! Nobody wants just to stand and look on, now do they – not if they can help it! All right, all right, I’m going!’

‘No, wait! You made the coffee up here?’

‘On me own gas ring.’

‘And where did you get the milk?’

‘Out of the big jug in the fridge. And the sugar is what I got in Ledbury last time I went shopping there for Mrs Simmons. So what?’

Adriana waved her away, and she went out, shutting the door with some unnecessary force.

Ninian raised his eyebrows.

‘And what is all that about?’

‘Oh, nothing at all.’

‘Meaning if I don’t ask questions I won’t be told any lies?’

‘If you like to put it that way. Do you still take all the sugar you can get?’

‘I do. Especially when it’s the fancy barleysugar kind. I’ll even go so far as to have Janet’s share when she’s given up taking it.’

Janet said, ‘I haven’t.’

‘But a really unselfish woman would let me have it all the same.’

‘Then I’m not really unselfish.’

Adriana watched them. She was weighing what each had said about the other, and weighing just how far it would bear the very considerable strain that might be placed upon it. They were young, they had everything before them – trouble and heartache, and the moments which make up for it all. She had had her share of them. She had walked among the stars. If she was offered her life over again, she wondered if she would take it. She supposed she would, so long as she didn’t know what was coming. That was what sapped the strength and slowed the heart – to watch the inevitable approach of something which casts its threatening shadow across your path, stealing up behind you, reaching forward to darken the coming day. Stupid to think of that when she had made up her mind that the shadow was only a shadow and held no threat. Stupid to have these moments when nothing seemed to be quite worth while. Oh, well, when you were up you were up, and when you were down you were down. That had always been her way, but nobody had ever got her down for long. And she had had a good run, a long run. A long run had its drawbacks – you got stale. And yet you were sorry when it came to an end. But it wasn’t the end yet, and what was the use of thinking about it? She pulled herself up against the cream brocade cushions and said,

‘I’m going to throw a party. Gertie and I have been making out lists.’

Chapter Eleven

Janet came out of Adriana Ford’s room and went along to the nursery. She was thinking what an extraordinary person Adriana was, and that she couldn’t possibly be as old as Star had said. There was something alive about her, something that would always take the middle of the stage, whether she held it with that tragic look, with gay talk about her new clothes and the parties she meant to give, or with the searching questions which came crashing in among your own most private affairs. What did she mean, asking those questions about Ninian, and why did she need to ask them of a stranger? He was her own relation, and had known him all his life. What could Janet tell her that she did not know already? Janet was wondering why she had answered her at all. And then the door opened behind her and Ninian was following her into the room. He said, ‘Well?’ with a question in his voice, and she said, ‘Good-night.’

He laughed.

‘Oh, I’m not going away – far from it! We are going to have a nursery crack.’

‘We are not!’

‘Darling, we are. I wouldn’t dream of locking the door and taking away the key. I shall use only moral suasion.’

‘Ringan, go to bed!’

The old Border form of his name came without her meaning to use it. It had been common coin when they were children, but even then the elders had frowned upon it as smacking too much of the vulgar. It was an odd variant for Ninian, and she had always wondered about it, but it came easily to her tongue.

His look softened.

‘It’s a long time since you called me that, my jo Janet.’

‘I didn’t mean to. I don’t know why I did.’

‘You’re a cold, hard lass, but you slip into being human just once in a way. And now stop talking about yourself and tell me what you think of Adriana.’

Janet’s colour rose.

‘I was not talking about myself!’

‘All right, darling, have it your own way. But I want to talk about Adriana. What did you think of her?’

Janet frowned.

‘She is not like anyone else.’

‘Fortunately! Imagine a houseful of Adrianas! Spontaneous combustion wouldn’t be in it! You know, that is the trouble with Meriel – she is the imitation, the bad copy, the local dressmaker’s version of a Paris model. She gets the mannerisms here and there, but she doesn’t begin to have Adriana’s courage and drive, to say nothing of her talent. Amazing person! What did she say to you when she sent me out of the room?’

‘That’s asking.’

‘Don’t I get an answer?’

She shook her head. He said,

‘Did she?’

She shook her head again.

‘Does that mean she didn’t, or that you won’t tell?’

‘You can please yourself.’

He laughed.

‘You are a very aggravating woman. What would you do if I was to shake you – call for help?’

‘I might.’

‘Then I can tell you who would come – Meriel. She is the only one near enough. And what fun that would be – for her! A part to play after her own heart! Brutal seducer checked! An angel to the rescue! Foolish inexperienced damsel rebuked and warned!’