"Because I saw them come up the drive. Is that good enough for once? But they didn't see me, no thank you."

"Well, well. They missed a sight then, didn't they, Moira?"

"Oh you are dreadful this morning. Now I'll ask you a question. Where's Dan?"

"Who?"

"I mean Ted."

"The goose? She's fed. It was a good thing I had plenty."

"Why, how's that?"

"Because she's down by the water, this minute, if I know much of Ted," Mr Rock said.

She gave another little shriek.

"Mr Rock that's foul," she cried.

"Grubbing about," he added.

"I shan't stay if you're like this. All you ever want is to give me creeps," she said.

"You'll stay," he countered.

"Why, how's that?" she repeated, making no move to depart.

"You told me you'd have to get back a long while since."

There was a pause while she pouted. But he did not bother to notice.

"Will you come to the dance tonight?" she asked, in a small voice.

"I might," he said.

"Because, if you did, I'd sit one out with you."

"That's a more sensible suggestion than saying you'd spare me a dance." He chopped harder at the branch.

"Because, if you did, I might even give you a kiss," she continued. The chopping stopped. But he did not look up.

"There's an absurd idea," he said loudly. "If you want to know I've completely forgotten about it."

"I mean what I promise," she insisted.

"All I intended to convey," he said, frightened and embarrassed, "was, thank God, I've reached an age when I've long since forgotten everything to do with all such nonsense. Now do you understand?"

"No," she answered.

"Then why not?"

"Because I bet you haven't really," she said. He went on with his work rather fast.

"Well, well," he tried to pass it off, uneasily.

"I don't know what else a girl can promise," she suggested. He let this go.

Then she began again. She dropped her voice to a whisper, so that he unwillingly stopped work to catch what was said through the disfiguring deafness.

"Now this is really secret," she informed him. "Have you heard about Mr Adams?"

"Look, Moira, I'm not here to chatter with students."

"Oh, if someone doesn't want to listen, I can't make them, can I?"

"All right," he said. "There's no need to be forward." She inferred from this last remark that she had his blessing.

"There's some of the juniors meet Mr Adams of a night time. If we could only find which, we'd put an end to that, double quick."

"Who's we?" he asked, surprised into going on with it.

"Why, the seniors."

"Miss Baker and Miss Edge don't know, then?"

"Those two old pussies," she protested. "They'll never learn what really happens here. But that's why it's so silly your saying what you just did. You and he are the same age, anyway there can't be more between you than there is between me and one of the juniors."

"You're out of your mind, child. I'm old enough to be the man's father. And in any case, I don't like this."

"I'm sorry," she said, with an extraordinary look of innocence.

"That's all right. I've forgotten all about it," he repeated severely. But he straightened his back, and took off the spectacles once more, to wipe them.

"Then you will come to the dance tonight," she announced.

"I might," he said. "Will Miss Edge and Miss Baker be in attendance?"

"Of course. They've come back already, like I told. Anyway they only go up for the day, Wednesdays. No, they had to come home in a rush because of Mary and Merode. And when we gave them all the start we could."

"What?" he protested, laughing at last. "If this is any more of your nonsense then I don't want it, that's all."

"Well you see," she said, "Mary was almost forever on orderly duty. Edge said she always was so neat. Marion's the senior today and when Mary didn't turn up, because I promise I never heard a word about Merode till later, Marion asked what she should tell the old grumps. And sure enough Edge spotted Mary wasn't there at once, so Marion told her like I said, that Mary had gone to Matron."

"I don't understand a word," he protested more cheerfully still, and went back to his work.

"Oh, you are dense," she cried. "D'you know while I stand here to pass the time of day with you my arms are simply dropping from all these branches for the dance?" She was indeed a lovely sight as she stood before him. But he laughed once more.

"Then you'd better rid yourself," he said.

"You are in a dreadful mood today. Goodbye for now," she said, and went off, happily pouting.

"Now dear our Directives," Baker said as Marchbanks left the room. "Be careful, do dear. You said yourself the child should not be cross-examined."

"But, Baker, she has not been crossexamined, has she?" Edge cried out, and pushed the saucer away with its empty cup. "If she has, this is the first I have heard."

"Her parents are not living, dear. If they hold an Enquiry they'll call it cross-examination."

"Oh, it does so aggravate one, Baker. Because she holds the answer to Mary's whereabouts."

"Wherever the poor child may be, with her parents away in Brazil, she can stay for a while yet," Miss Baker said, dabbing at her eyes with a handkerchief, rather in the same way that Mr Dakers had patted his mouth at breakfast.

"Why, what on earth do you mean?" Miss Edge protested. "You are surely not going to suggest. .?"

"I suggest nothing, dear," Baker insisted in a tired voice. "All I say is that Mary can't have got very far, unless of course she has a conveyance. We left instructions about the station and the coaches, and now you have a policeman to see you. No, we must remember the poor mite was sick."

"I know nothing of it," Edge objected. "Her name is not down on Matron's list."

"But don't you recollect, dear? It was you who asked what had happened to Mary at breakfast, and Marion told you she'd gone to Matron!'

"So she did," Miss Edge exclaimed. "That puts an entirely different complexion on the matter. In fact, when I come to consider, I cannot understand how Marchbanks has not been able to drag the wretched girl back to us already. So unnecessary, too, to send for the Inspector. Because he will need some good reason to explain our bringing him up here. The staff simply will not take in what I keep drumming into them about undesirable publicity."

"We haven't found her yet, dear."

But Edge had now gone to the opposite extreme, was overconfident. "Why," she said, and left her desk to go over to the window, "the whole affair is a mare's nest, something tells me." Miss Baker had also risen. She moved over to the telephone.

"And such a shame," Miss Edge continued, holding on to folded curtains at either side with both hands, to face a bright prospect as though crucified. "What a very real shame to torture our nerves in this glorious weather just when the old Place is at its own great best."

"Madam here," Baker said into the receiver. "Would you have Marion sent along at once."