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flats or cottages, a husband who earned enough to keep her and the boys in the manner to which her mother had taught her she should be accustomed. And there was Edward. Although, before she met him, she had heard that he had a reputation with women, she was pretty sure that once their affair had begun he’d remained faithful to her. ‘I’ve fallen for you,’ he had said. ‘Hook, line and sinker.’ And the less she felt about him, the more she encouraged the notion that theirs was a great romantic attachment which nothing could destroy.
    Much of this was concealed, even from herself – dishonesty of this kind needs to begin at home, as it were – and once he had taken the step of leaving Villy for her, she had done everything in her power to make him feel she had been worth it. Strong Martinis were on hand the moment he came home from work; she encouraged him to talk about what sort of day he had had; Mrs Atkinson learned how to cook the game that he shot exactly as he liked it; she sympathised tactfully with him over the differences he was beginning to have with Hugh about how the firm should be run, and did what she could to ingratiate herself with his family. When he worried and complained about Villy refusing to allow Roland to meet her, she had explained that she entirely understood Villy’s attitude: that it was unwise to split Roland’s affections, and how, had she been in that situation, she would probably have done the same. She expertly skimmed this particular guilt off him with an ease that increased his need for her.
    ‘Darling! Of course you mustn’t let Jamie down.’ Did she detect some relief in his voice? Possibly, but it didn’t really matter.

LOUISE
    ‘What I can’t stand is when she looks me in the eye and starts a sentence “Quite frankly . . .” There’s absolutely nothing frank about her at all!’
    Joseph Waring regarded her with amusement. Indignation became her, and he told her so. They were dining, as they often did, at L’Étoile in Charlotte Street, where the food was good and, by English standards, unusual and delicious. Louise, her blonde hair scraped back from her forehead and secured by a black velvet bow, wore a black dress that had a low round neck and short sleeves, both finished with scallops made of the same material. In it, she looked very young and ethereal but she had an appetite that never ceased to amaze him, and which was much approved of by the patron , who had one day suggested she might like to lunch there every day on the house – provided she was prepared to do it at the window table. ‘But I would feel like those women in Holland – you know, the tarts,’ she told Joseph, and blushed faintly at the very idea.
    They had met at a party that Stella had taken her to. Stella had become a political journalist: she was an ardent Labour supporter and had been devastated when ‘stuffed-shirt Eden’ had won the election, ousting her beloved Attlee. She wrote regularly for the Observer and the Manchester Guardian and occasionally reviewed books for the New Statesman . She was popular and got asked, or got herself asked, to a great many parties and sometimes took Louise with her ‘to broaden her mind’. Louise privately thought Stella a bit of a fanatic, and Stella had derided Louise’s Torydom. ‘Of course you’ll vote for them: most Tories don’t have any political convictions at all – they simply vote the way their class always has.’ This silenced her because in her case it was true. Louise wasn’t interested in politics and her family – excepting Uncle Rupert – had always voted Conservative.
    The party, which was large, seemed to have every kind of person in it. The room was thick with smoke and the steady oceanic sound of a great many people trying to make themselves heard. She had felt completely at sea, paralysed by a shyness that she now recognised always overcame her when she had to enter a room full of unknown people. Stella had been swept