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stranger, to make her known to her own cousins.
    But she couldn’t help the relief of being capably looked after. The old Chinese woman looked so remote and unapproachable, and the children seemed likely to burst into tears at any moment. It was nice to see Adam Marsh swing the little boy into his arms, and tell the girl to take Miss Davenport’s hand. It made them a little family, filing through the gates, the amah discreetly a few paces behind.
    The cab was waiting. The luggage was hoisted on top, and the children, then Fanny, followed by the amah who was plainly terrified of this new method of transport, got inside. Hannah, who was relieved to have everyone safely arrived, climbed in next, and Mr Marsh told the driver to take them to Paddington station.
    As Fanny was leaning out to repeat her thanks to him, he lifted a long leg on to the step.
    ‘Is there room inside for me? I think so. Nolly and Marcus and Ching Mei take up the space of only one small person. Marcus can come on my lap.’
    He settled down comfortably, his knees all but touching Fanny’s.
    ‘But, Mr Marsh—’
    ‘Not a word, Miss Davenport, It’s no trouble to me at all. Besides,’ he patted his pocket, and surely the gravity of his face didn’t conceal the irreverent amusement, ‘I have been well paid. Now let me have the pleasure of presenting your cousins to you. This,’ he took the little girl’s hand, ‘is Olivia, but I understand she has always been called Nolly. And this young fellow is Marcus. Shake hands with your cousin—’ he hesitated questioningly.
    ‘Fanny,’ said Fanny reluctantly, and only for the benefit of the children. This stranger was taking too much on himself. Hannah was looking at him with disapproval. It was the way she should be looking at him, too. Yet she couldn’t help liking the easy way he held the little boy in his lap. He surely couldn’t be just a lowly shipping clerk. Perhaps he was the son of the owner, learning the business from the ground up, as some young men did.
    ‘Your cousin Fanny,’ he said, prompting the children, who reluctantly held out limp cold hands to be shaken.
    The little girl spoke for the first time.
    ‘Are we going to live with you?’
    The unmistakably hostile and perfectly contained voice abruptly brought Fanny to a realisation of what she had let happen to herself. In a moment of emotion and pity and sympathy she had sacrificed her chances of happiness, happiness which for her lay only in living an independent and worthwhile life. She had gone down on her knees on a dusty smutty railway station and promised two strange children that they would be safe with her.
    She never broke promises. She would particularly never break one made to a trusting child. But in the close confines of the cab the strange atmosphere of lostness and danger that had seemed to hang over the children had vanished, and they were just two children like any others, the girl with her cool hostile gaze, the boy not much more than a baby, his nose needing attention, his eyelids beginning to droop.
    They would have been all right at Darkwater, with Hannah and Dora, and the little alien-faced amah who as yet had not said a word.
    But now she had promised, and already they, or the girl at least, odd little precocious creature, was looking to her for reassurance. And anyway this interfering Adam Marsh obviously meant to stay until the moment the train left, with them all safely aboard. It wasn’t any business of his. He was exceeding his duties. But one had to suppose he meant well.
    Fanny’s resentment against the children encompassed him, too. Did he think she looked the kind of person who would be content with living in the background all her life?
    But how could he know she did that? She was the niece of a wealthy man. He probably saw her living a leisured and pampered life. Uncle Edgar had always meant outsiders to see just that.
    Fanny impatiently loosened the fastenings of her fur-trimmed cape. It was