The young Mr. Lomax was not very young at all. He was probably about the age the old Mr. Lomax was when the twins turned up at his office wanting money for John-the-dig's funeral. He shook my hand, a curious gleam in his eye, a half-smile on his lips, and I understood that to him we were conspirators. For years he had been the only person to know the other identity of his client Miss March; he had inherited the secret from his father along with the cherry desk, the filing cabinets and the pictures on the wall. Now, after all the years of secrecy, there came another person who knew what he knew.

"Glad to meet you, Miss Lea. What can I do to help?"

"I've come from Angelfield. From the site. The police are there. They've found a body." "Oh. Oh, goodness!" "Will the police want to speak to Miss Winter, do you suppose?" At my mention of the name, his eyes flickered discreetly to the door, checking that we could not be overheard. "They would want to speak to the owner of the property as a matter of routine." "I thought so." I hurried on. "The thing is, not only is she ill- I suppose you know that?"

He nodded.

"-but also, her sister is dying."

He nodded, gravely, and did not interrupt.

"It would be better, given her fragility and the state of her sister's health, if she did not receive the news about the discovery too abruptly. She should not hear it from a stranger. And she should not be alone when the information reaches her."

"What do you suggest?"

"I can go back to Yorkshire today. If I can get to the station in the next hour, I can be there this evening. The police will have to come through you to contact her, won't they?"

"Yes. But I can delay things by a few hours. Enough time for you to get there. I can also drive you to the station, if you like."

At that moment the telephone rang. We exchanged an anxious look as he picked it up.

"Bones? I see… She is the owner of the property, yes… An elderly person and in poor health… A sister, gravely ill… Some likelihood of an imminent bereavement… It might be better… Given the circumstances… I happen to know of someone who is going there in person this very evening… Eminently trustworthy… Quite… Indeed… By all means."

He made a note on a pad and pushed it across the desk to me. A name and a telephone number.

"He would like you to telephone him when you get there to let him know how things stand with the lady. If she is able to, he will talk to her then; if not, it can wait. The remains, it seems, are not recent. Now, what time is your train? We should be going."

Seeing that I was deep in thought, the not-so-very-young Mr. Lomax drove in silence. Nevertheless a quiet excitement seemed to be eating away at him, and eventually, turning in to the road where the station was, he could contain himself no longer. "The thirteenth tale… " he said. "I don't suppose…?"

"I wish I knew," I told him. "I'm sorry."

He pulled a disappointed face.

As the station loomed into sight, I asked a question of my own. "Do you happen to know Aurelius Love?" "The caterer! Yes, I know him. The man's a culinary genius!" "How long have you known him?" He answered without thinking-"Actually, I was at school with him"-and in the middle of the sentence a curious quiver entered his voice, as though he had just realized the implications of my inquiry. My next question did not surprise him.

"When did you learn that Miss March was Miss Winter? Was it when you took over your father's business?" He swallowed. "No." Blinked. "It was before. I was still at school. She came to the house one day. To see my father. It was more private than the office. They had some business to sort out and, without going into confidential details, it became clear during the course of their conversation that Miss March and Miss Winter were the same person. I was not eavesdropping, you understand. That is to say, not deliberately. I was already under the dining room table when they came in-there was a tablecloth that draped and made it into a sort of tent, you see-and I didn't want to embarrass my father by emerging suddenly, so I just stayed quiet."

What was it Miss Winter had told me? There can be no secrets in a house where there are children.

We had come to a stop in front of the station, and the young Mr. Lomax turned his stricken eyes toward me. "I told Aurelius. The day he told me he had been found on the night of the fire. I told him that Miss Adeline Angelfield and Miss Vida Winter were one and the same person. I'm sorry."

"Don't worry about it. It doesn't matter now, anyway. I only wondered."

"Does she know I told Aurelius who she was?"

I thought about the letter Miss Winter had sent me right at the beginning, and about Aurelius in his brown suit, seeking the story of his origins. "If she guessed, it was decades ago. If she knows, I think you can presume she doesn't care."

The shadow cleared from his brow.

"Thanks for the lift."

And I ran for the train.

HESTER'S DIARY II

From the station I made a phone call to the bookshop. My father could not hide his disappointment when I told him I would not be coming home. "Your mother will be sorry," he said.

"Will she?"

"Of course she will."

"I have to go back. I think I might have found Hester."

"Where?"

"They have found bones at Angelfield."

"Bones?"

"One of the builders discovered them when he was excavating the library today."

"Gracious."

"They are bound to get in touch with Miss Winter to ask her about it. And her sister is dying. I can't leave her on her own up there. She needs me."

"I see." His voice was serious.

"Don't tell Mother," I warned him, "but Miss Winter and her sister are twins."

He was silent. Then he just said, "You will take care, won't you, Margaret?"

A quarter of an hour later I had settled into my seat next to the window and was taking Hester's diary out of my pocket.

I should like to understand a great deal more about optics. Sitting with Mrs. Dunne in the drawing room going over meal plans for the week, I caught sight of a sudden movement in the mirror. "Emmeline!" I exclaimed, irritated, for she was not supposed to be in the house at all, but outside, getting her daily exerciseandfresh air. It was my own mistake, of course, for I had only to look out of the window to see that she was outside, and hersister, too, playing nicely for once. What I had seen, caught a misleading glimpse of, to beprecise, must have been a flash of sunlight come in the window and reflected in the mirror.

On reflection (On reflection! An unintended drollery!), it is the psychology of seeing that caused my misapprehension, as much as any strangeness in the workings of the optical world. For being used to seeing the twins wandering about the house in places I would not expect them to be, and at times when I would expect them to be elsewhere, I have fallen into the habit of interpreting every movement out of the corner of my eye as evidence of their presence. Hence a flash of sunlight reflected in a mirror presents itself in a very convincing manner to the mind as a girl in a white dress. To guard against errors such as this, one would have to teachoneself to view everything without preconception, to abandon all habitual modes of thought. There is much to be said in favor of such an attitude in principle. The freshness of mind! The virginal response to the world! So much science has at its root the ability to see afresh what has been seen and thought to be understoodfor centuries. However, in ordinary life, one cannot live by such principles. Imagine the time it would take if every aspect of experience had to be scrutinized afresh every minute of every day. No; in ordertofree ourselves from the mundane it is essential that we delegate much of our interpretation of the world to that lower area of the mind that deals with the presumed, the assumed, the probable. Even though it sometimes leads us astray and causes us to misinterpret a flash of sunlight as a girl in a white dress, when these two things are as unlike as two things can be.