“Well, yes.”

“I think Gretchen and Edward think about that a great deal.”

“Well, they would. Poor girl. She must suffer great anxiety about her parents. It’s not good for the baby. Thank God Edward was able to bring her out, at least.”

“She is safe now.”

“She has a husband to protect her, but that won’t stop her worrying about her family. Kurt is such a nice young man. I think he came over to see them just before Christmas.”

“It was a pity they could not go there.”

“I don’t think Edward would want Gretchen to go to Germany just yet.”

“Perhaps it will all blow over.”

“These things often do.”

There was no mistaking Richard Dorrington’s pleasure in seeing us. He took my hands and held them firmly.

“I’ve been wondering when you would come,” he said.

“We have been away, of course.”

“Yes, in Cornwall. I hope your sister is well. Mary Grace told us a good deal about the place when she came home after that lovely holiday you gave her.”

“It was lovely to have her, and Dorabella was very pleased with her picture.”

“Dear Mary Grace! You have brought her out, I can tell you. We are all so grateful to you, my mother and I as much as Mary Grace.”

“She could really be a great artist.”

“She is very diffident. She says miniatures are not much in fashion now.”

“She must make them a fashion. She can, with a talent like hers, I am sure.”

“You see how good it is for us all to have you back.”

Over the dinner table at the Dorringtons it was impossible to keep the subject of Germany out of the conversation.

There were four other guests—a lawyer and his wife and a doctor and his.

As we had come through the streets to the house, we could not help but see the placards, and the newsboys were shouting: “Standard, News…Read all about it.” “Hitler meets Austrian Chancellor.” “Schuschnigg at Berchtesgaden.”

“What does it mean?” asked my mother as our taxi took us to the Dorringtons.

Edward said: “I don’t know. But I don’t like the sound of it.”

He took Gretchen’s hand and held it for a moment. I wished we had not seen those placards.

As we sat at dinner the doctor said: “It looks as though Hitler is planning to take over Austria.”

“He couldn’t do that,” said Edward.

“We shall see,” replied the doctor.

I wished they would stop talking of the situation, but naturally it was a subject which was uppermost in people’s minds at this time. The papers were full of it, and many were waiting with great interest to hear the result of the meeting between Hitler and Kurt von Schuschnigg.

The lawyer said: “We should have been firm long ago. Hitler and Mussolini are hand in glove. Dictators, both of them. No one can stop them, not among their own people anyway. It’s impossible to curb dictators except by deposing them, and it would be a brave man who tried to shake those two. In my opinion, Hitler is bent on conquest. He wants an empire and he is going to do everything he can to get it. He has got rid of Schacht who has tried to call a halt to the excessive storing up of armaments because it is crippling the economy. Blomberg and Fritsch and others have gone because they were professional soldiers who advised caution.”

“And where is it all leading?” asked Richard.

“I think a great deal depends on the outcome of this meeting. Schuschnigg is no weakling. He won’t allow Hitler to walk over him.”

“We shall know in due course,” said Richard.

I managed to catch his eyes and looked toward Gretchen. He understood. As for her, she had turned rather pale and was staring down at her plate.

“Now tell me,” went on Richard immediately, “what are you planning to do while you are in London?”

“So much,” I replied, “that I am sure we shall not succeed in doing it all.”

“There is a remedy,” he said. “Stay longer.”

While the men lingered over the port, I had a chance to talk to Gretchen in the drawing room.

“You must be very excited about the baby,” I said.

“Oh, yes.”

I laid my hand on her arm and said gently: “Don’t worry, Gretchen.”

“I think of them,” she said quietly. “Hitler is getting more powerful every day. I don’t know what he will do next to our people.”

“Have your family been…?”

She shook her head. “Not yet…but they must expect…”

“They should get out, Gretchen.”

“They won’t leave. I have written to them. So has Edward. Edward says, ‘Come over here. We’ll manage somehow.’ But they won’t. They are so stubborn…so proud. It is their home, they say, and they are not going to be driven out of it.”

“What are they going to do?”

“They will stay as long as they can.”

“How glad I am that you are here!”

“Edward did that. It is wonderful for me, but I think much of my home and family.”

“Dear Gretchen, let us hope that some day it will be different. I am so pleased that Edward brought you out, and now there is the baby. My mother is delighted. She wants to be here for the birth. Did you know that?”

She nodded and I was glad to see her smile.

“When the baby comes…you will feel better.”

She looked at me and smiled rather sadly and I wished there was something I could do to comfort her.

My mother and I spoke of the evening over breakfast next morning.

“I wish that people would not talk all the time about what is happening in Germany,” I said.

“It is certainly the topic of the moment and it is, of course, very important.”

“I know, but the papers are full of it and it does so much upset Gretchen.”

“She can’t help wondering what is happening in her old home. I do hope everything is going to be all right.”

“She’ll be better, perhaps, when she gets the baby. She won’t have much time then to think of much else.”

She was certainly cheered when we went shopping together. There was a great deal of discussion about prams and cradles.

Edward was delighted that we were there, and when I saw him with Gretchen it occurred to me that there did not appear to be the same unwavering devotion between Dermot and Dorabella. But then Edward and Gretchen were earnest people. Both Dorabella and Dermot were light-hearted and perhaps did not betray the depth of their emotions as Edward and Gretchen did.

Mary Grace and I went to see an exhibition of paintings which was interesting. The lawyer and his wife came and had a drink with us and I showed them Mary Grace’s portrait of Dorabella, which I had brought with me. When the lawyer’s wife admired it enthusiastically, I suggested she herself would make a good subject.

I was delighted to have secured a commission for Mary Grace.

I had an idea that the lawyer’s wife lived a fairly busy social life and I was sure that when the miniature was completed, if she were satisfied with it, she would show it to her friends. I should be surprised if at least one other commission did not come out of it.

Knowing my mother’s fondness for the opera, Richard took us all to see Rigoletto, which was an evening of sheer enchantment. We had supper afterwards and talked animatedly about the setting and costumes as well as the wonderful music. I laughingly said I might have been Gilda instead of Violetta.

“Violetta is much more charming,” said Richard, “and it is better to have a namesake dying gracefully in her bed taking her top notes with ease rather than lying in a sack.”

There was a great deal of laughter, but the evening was marred slightly by the news which greeted us when we were on the way back to the house.

Hitler had forced Schuschnigg to sign an agreement before he left Berchtesgaden giving the Austrian Nazis a free hand.

A few days later Richard invited me to dinner. There were to be just the two of us.

It was strange because usually we went in a party. There was a reason, of course, and my mother knew what it meant.