In the silence of Hetton, the telephone rang near the housekeeper’s room and was switched through to the library. Tony answered it.

‘This is Jock speaking. I’ve just seen Brenda. She’s coming down by the seven o’clock train.’

‘Is she terribly upset?’

‘Yes, naturally.’

‘Where is she now?’

‘She’s with me. I’m speaking from Polly’s.’

‘Shall I talk to her?’

‘Better not.’

‘All right ... I’ll meet that train. Are you coming too?’

‘No.’

‘Well, you’ve been wonderful. I don’t know what I should have done without you and Mrs Rattery.’

‘Oh, that’s all right. I’ll see Brenda off.’

She had stopped crying and sat crouched in the chair. She did not look up while Jock telephoned. Then she said, ‘Yes, I’ll go by that train.’

‘We ought to start. I suppose you will have to get some things from the flat.’

‘My bag ... upstairs. You get it. I can’t go in there again.’

She did not speak on her way to her flat. She sat beside Jock as he drove, looking straight ahead. When they arrived she unlocked her door and led him in. The room was extremely empty of furniture. She sat down in the only chair. ‘There’s plenty of time really. Tell me exactly what happened.’

Jock told her.

‘Poor little boy,’ she said. ‘Poor little boy.’

Then she opened her cupboard and began to put a few things into a suitcase; she went in and out from the bathroom once or twice. ‘That’s everything,’ she said. ‘There’s still too much time.’

‘Would you like anything to eat?’

‘Oh no, nothing to eat.’ She sat down again and looked at herself in the glass. She did not attempt to do anything to her face. ‘When you first told me,’ she said. ‘I didn’t understand. I didn’t know what I was saying.’

‘I know.’

‘I didn’t say anything, did I?’

‘You know what you said.’

‘Yes, I know ... I didn’t mean ... I don’t think it’s any good trying to explain.’

Jock said, ‘Are you sure you’ve got everything?’

‘Yes, that’s everything,’ she nodded towards the little case on the bed. She looked quite hopeless.

‘Well, we’d better go to the station.’

‘All right. It’s early. But it doesn’t matter.’

Jock took her to the train. As it was Wednesday the carriages were full of women returning after their day’s shopping.

‘Why not go first-class?’

‘No, no. I always go third.’

She sat in the middle of a row. The women on either side looked at her curiously, wondering if she were ill.

‘Don’t you want anything to read?’

‘Nothing to read.’

‘Or eat?’

‘Or eat.’

‘Then I’ll say good-bye.’

‘Good-bye.’

Another woman pushed past Jock into the carriage, laden with light parcels.



When the news became known, Marjorie said to Allan, ‘Well, anyway, this will mean the end of Mr Beaver.’

But Polly Cockpurse said to Veronica, ‘That’s the end of Tony so far as Brenda is concerned.’

The impoverished Lasts were stunned by the telegram. They lived on an extensive but unprofitable chicken farm near Princes Risborough. It did not enter the heads of any of them that now, if anything happened, they were the heirs to Hetton. Had it done so, their grief would have been just as keen.

Jock drove from Paddington to Bratt’s. One of the men by the bar said, ‘Ghastly thing about Tony Last’s boy.’

‘Yes, I was there.’

‘No, were you? What a ghastly thing.’

Later a telephone message came: ‘Princess Abdul Akbar wishes to know whether you are in the club.’

‘No, no, tell her I’m not here,’ said Jock.