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to have to make the journey on Monday morning, and she had the horrid impression that he knew exactly why she wanted to get back to London, even down to the fact that there was cold fear at the back of her eagerness.
    Miraculously, as though she sensed the necessity for trivialities once more, Mrs. Tamberly entered the conversation at this point, and nothing else of importance was said before it was time to go to bed.
    The next day Mrs. Tamberly contrived to maintain the same atmosphere of pleasant uneventfulness, and this time Hope was almost glad of it. She wanted no drama or crisis here—she wanted to get back to London with as little fuss and delay as possible, and assure herself that there was no drama or crisis there either. If she could just be assured that none of the events of the last few weeks would affect her future with Richard, then she would do without excitement for the rest of her life.
    The children were a little surprised, but not dismayed, by the information that Hope was returning to Town that day, while they would remain there for their holidays. They had already accepted the arrangement in principle, and the promise that they should go to London and spend a day with her soon quite satisfied them.
    Bridget looked rather solemn when she kissed them good-bye, but they were used to seeing her only at weekends during their holidays, and there was nothing uncomfortably novel about bidding her good-bye for a week or ten days.
    Dr. Tamberly drove her to the station, with little comment passing between them. She wondered if he would have the effrontery to refer to Richard again. He was so much in her own mind that she felt her companion must surely sense the fact and make some observation about it. But Errol Tamberly for once showed a disposition to mind his own business.
    During the few minutes that they waited for the train he made only one observation of importance.
    “I don’t know if mother made it clear—but please regard this as your home as well as the twins’ for as long as you want it. At the risk of sounding once more like the heavy guardian, I must repeat that your father asked me to look after—all of you.”
    “It’s very kind of you,” Hope said, but, remembering his remarks about Richard, she could not, by any effort, make her voice sound anything but cold. Nor could she bring herself to utter the polite lie that she would be glad to avail herself of the invitation.
    She was glad—and she supposed he was too—that the train came in very soon after that. At any rate he looked gloomy and not very good-tempered as he bade her goodbye.
    It was an unspeakable relief to lean back in her corner seat and reflect that, as she had got away even earlier than she had hoped, there would almost certainly be time to see Richard, as well as telephone him, that evening.
    At Charing Cross she thankfully hailed a taxi, and not until she was sitting in it did she reflect guiltily, ‘I ought to think in terms of buses, not taxis now.”
    But it was too late to bother about that now—and, anyway, this was a special occasion.
    She was trembling by the time she reached her flat, and she ran up the stairs instead of waiting for the lift, because anything but personal action had suddenly become impossible. Her hand shook so much that it was difficult to fit her key into the lock. But, once she had opened the door and shut it again behind her, she felt as though she had woken from a feverish dream to a world of blessed reality. Less than thirty-six hours ago she had left this place, knowing that, whatever else happened, she and Richard would soon be happily married. Now, as she stood looking round on every familiar object—even the chair in which Richard had sat the day before yesterday—all her confidence returned, and she knew that nothing Errol Tamberly had said altered—or could alter—the situation between herself and Richard.
    Without even waiting to take off her hat and coat, Hope picked up the