‘We have been talking about marriage,’ said Mrs Maclintick aggressively.

She addressed herself to Miss Weedon, who in return gave her a smile that cut like a knife.

‘Indeed?’ she said.

‘This gentleman and I have been comparing notes,’ said Mrs Maclintick, indicating Stringham.

‘We have, indeed,’ said Stringham laughing. ‘And found a lot to agree about.’

He had dropped his former air of burlesque, now appeared completely sober.

‘It sounds a very interesting discussion,’ said Miss Weedon.

She spoke in a tone damaging to Mrs Maclintick’s self-esteem. Miss Weedon was undoubtedly prepared to take anybody on; Mrs Maclintick; anybody. I admired her for that.

‘Why don’t you tell us what you think about marriage yourself?’ asked Mrs Maclintick, who had drunk more champagne than I had at first supposed. ‘They say the onlooker sees most of the game.’

‘Not now,’ said Miss Weedon, in the cosmically terminating voice of one who holds authority to decide when the toys must be returned to the toy-cupboard. ‘I have my little car outside, Charles. I thought you might like a lift home.’

‘But he is going to take me to a night-club,’ said Mrs Maclintick, her voice rising in rage. ‘He said that after we had settled a few points about marriage we would go to a very amusing place he knew of.’

Miss Weedon looked at Stringham without a trace of surprise or disapproval; just a request for confirmation.

‘That was the suggestion, Tuffy.’

He laughed again. He must have known by experience that in the end Miss Weedon would turn out to hold all the cards, but he showed no sign yet of capitulation.

‘The doctor begged you not to stay up too late, Charles,’ said Miss Weedon, also smiling.

She was in no degree behind Stringham where keeping one’s head was concerned.

‘My medical adviser did indeed prescribe early hours,’ said Stringham. ‘You are right there, Tuffy. I distinctly recollect his words. But I was turning over in my mind the possibility of disregarding such advice. Ted Jeavons was speaking recently of some night haunt he once visited where he had all kind of unusual adventures. A place run by one, Dicky Umfraville, a bad character whom I used to see in my Kenya days and have probably spoken of. Something about the sound of the joint attracted me. I offered to take Mrs Maclintick there. I can hardly go back on my promise. Of course, the club has no doubt closed down by now. Nothing Dicky Umfraville puts his hand to lasts very long. Besides, Ted was a little vague about the year his adventure happened – it might have been during the war, when he was a gallant soldier on leave from the trenches. That all came in when he told the story. However, if defunct, we could always visit the Bag of Nails.’

Mrs Maclintick snatched facetiously at him.

‘You know perfectly well I should hate any of those places,’ she said gaily, ‘and I believe you are only trying to get me there to make me feel uncomfortable.’

Miss Weedon remained unruffled.

‘I had no idea you were planning anything like that, Charles.’

‘It wasn’t exactly planned,’ said Stringham. ‘Just one of those brilliant improvisations that come to me of a sudden. My career has been built up on them. One of them brought me here tonight.’

‘But I haven’t agreed to come with you yet,’ said Mrs Maclintick, with some archness. ‘Don’t be too sure of that.’

‘I recognise, Madam, I can have no guarantee of such an honour,’ said Stringham, momentarily returning to his former tone. ‘I was not so presumptuous as to take your company for granted. It may even be that I shall venture forth into the night – by no means for the first time in my chequered career – on a lonely search for pleasure.’

‘Wouldn’t it really be easier to accept my offer of a lift?’ said Miss Weedon.

She spoke so lightly, so indifferently, that no one could possibly have guessed that in uttering those words she was issuing an order. There was no display of power. Even Stringham must have been aware that Miss Weedon was showing a respect for his own situation that was impeccable.

‘Much, much easier, Tuffy,’ he said. ‘But who am I to be given a life of ease?

Not for ever by still waters

Would we idly rest and stay…

I feel just like the hymn. Tonight I must take the hard road that leads to pleasure.’

‘We could give this lady a lift home too, if she liked,’ said Miss Weedon.

She glanced at Mrs Maclintick as if prepared to accept the conveyance of her body at whatever the cost. It was a handsome offer on Miss Weedon’s part, a very handsome offer. No just person could have denied that.

‘But I am not much in the mood for going home, Tuffy,’ said Stringham, ‘and I am not sure that Mrs Maclintick is either, in spite of her protests to the contrary. We are young. We want to see life. We feel we ought not to limit our experience to musical parties, however edifying.’

There was a short pause.

‘If only I had known this, Charles,’ said Miss Weedon.

She spoke sadly, almost as if she were deprecating her own powers of dominion, trying to minimise them because their very hugeness embarrassed her; like the dictator of some absolutist state who assures journalists that his most imperative decrees have to take an outwardly parliamentary form.

‘If only I had known,’ she said, ‘I could have brought your notecase. It was lying on the table in your room.’

Stringham laughed outright.

‘Correct, as usual, Tuffy,’ he said.

‘I happened to notice it.’

‘Money,’ said Stringham. ‘It is always the answer.’

‘But even if I had brought it, you would have been much wiser not to stay up late.’

‘Even if you had brought it, Tuffy,’ said Stringham, ‘the situation would remain unaltered, because there is no money in it.’

He turned to Mrs Maclintick.

‘Little Bo-Peep,’ he said, ‘I fear our jaunt is off. We shall have to visit Dicky Umfraville’s club, or the Bag of Nails, some other night.’

He made a movement to show he was ready to follow Miss Weedon.

‘I didn’t want to drag you away,’ she said, ‘but I thought it might save trouble as I happen to have the car with me.’

‘Certainly it would,’ said Stringham. ‘Save a lot of trouble. Limitless trouble. Untold trouble. I will bid you all good night.’

After that, Miss Weedon had him out of the house in a matter of seconds. There was the faintest suspicion of a reel as he followed her through the door. Apart from that scarcely perceptible lurch, Stringham’s physical removal was in general accomplished by her with such speed and efficiency that probably no one but myself recognised this trifling display of unsteadiness on his feet. The moral tactics were concealed almost equally successfully until the following day, when they became plain to me. The fact was, of course, that Stringham was kept without money; or at least on that particular evening Miss Weedon had seen to it that he had no more money on him than enabled buying the number of drinks that had brought him to his mother’s house. He must have lost his nerve as to the efficacy of his powers of cashing a cheque; perhaps no longer possessed a cheque-book. Otherwise, he would undoubtedly have proceeded with the enterprise set on foot. Possibly fatigue, too, stimulated by the sight of Miss Weedon, had played a part in evaporating desire to paint the town red in the company of Mrs Maclintick; perhaps in the end Stringham was inwardly willing to ‘go quietly’. That was the most likely of all. While these things had been happening, Moreland and Priscilla slipped away. I found myself alone with Mrs Maclintick.

‘Who was she, I should like to know,’ said Mrs Maclintick. ‘Not that I wanted all that to go wherever it was he wanted to take me. Not in the least. It was just that he was so pressing. But what a funny sort of fellow he is. I didn’t see why that old girl should butt in. Is she one of his aunts?’