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soon satisfied.
    ‘I knew where she kept a key, you see, outside. In the shed. She’d locked herself out once or twice by mistake. She hadn’t put up the chain on the door – we got in easily. It was rather surprising, that. She usually bolted it, too.’
    ‘And she’d taken sleeping pills?’
    ‘Yes. There she lay – quite tidy – just the newspaper thrown down on the floor beside her.’
    ‘The newspaper?’
    ‘The Telegraph, it was. I noticed particularly. She always took it.’
    Patrick’s glance, when he entered the room, had taken in two papers, neatly folded, on a coffee table. He focused on them now: The Times and the Daily Mail, his and hers, he supposed.
    ‘For which day?’
    ‘Monday, of course. It was on Monday night that she did it. I suppose she read the paper in bed while she waited for the pills to work. It seems funny, though. I don’t think I’d want to read the paper at a time like that.’
    It did seem funny. What would one do under such circumstances? Read poetry or the Bible? Or listen to the radio? Patrick could not imagine himself in such a situation.

 
Part IV
1
     
    Jane Conway recognised the sound of her brother’s car as it turned in at the gate and drew up in front of the house. She had not seen Patrick for some weeks, so she went out to meet him as he unfolded himself out of the MGB.
    ‘Well, what a surprise,’ she said. ‘Have you had lunch?’
    What with one thing and another, Patrick had forgotten about it. At this reminder, he realised that he was hungry. He said so.
    ‘There’s bread and cheese, and the remains of some ham,’ said Jane. ‘Come and tell me your news.’
    Patrick followed her into the house. She had been ironing in the kitchen, and he found a pleasant domestic scene there, with his nephew Andrew, now aged six, colouring in a drawing book at the table, and Miranda, almost two, playing with some wooden bricks. The children welcomed him with flattering joy. Andrew then resumed his task, but Miranda stood staring at Patrick with unblinking concentration.
    ‘She remembers me,’ he said, with fatuous delight.
    ‘Of course she does, idiot. She’s seen you a good few times before, though not lately, it’s true,’ said Jane. ‘Sit down and talk to her while I find you something to eat.’
    Patrick sat down at the table, facing Andrew, and Miranda at once stood leaning against his knee, still staring. Her unwavering gaze was solemn.
    ‘What does a child of this age want to discuss?’ he wondered aloud, staring back at her. She was fascinated, though he did not realise it, by her own twin reflections in his spectacles.
    ‘Show her this book,’ said Andrew helpfully, as one man to another, pushing one across to him. Patrick opened it at a page illustrated with ducks marching in line past some cows, but Miranda shut it firmly. Patrick approved her judgement. Holding her breath, she began to scramble on to his knee and reached out to seize his glasses.
    ‘Hey, Miranda, don’t do that,’ he protested.
    ‘Looking windows,’ said Miranda.
    ‘Yes, they are, but they won’t be if you bash them,’ said Patrick, pleased at this evidence of a possible philologist in the family. ‘Jane, have you got Monday’s Telegraph? You do take it, don’t you?’
    ‘Yes, we do – we may have it still. I’ll look,’ said Jane. ‘Why do you want it?’ She put the loaf, butter, cheese, ham and some tomatoes in front of him. ‘Help yourself,’ she instructed, removing Miranda and setting her back in front of her bricks.
    ‘To see if it reports a particular news item,’ said Patrick.
    ‘Keep an eye on this mob, then. The papers are in the shed. An old boy in the village has started collecting them for re-pulping. It’ll be there unless I’ve used it to wrap up rubbish,’ said Jane. She unplugged the iron and put it on top of a cupboard above her head, where Miranda could not reach it, and departed into the garden.
    Patrick cut a slice of bread and spread it