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Brindley: ‘What was she like?’
    ‘Frau Ridder? Not a very remarkable woman in any way. Youngish, dark hair and eyes. Medium height, medium size, passably goodlooking, but dressed in excruciatingly bad taste. I remember thinking that she must be colourblind. She favoured very bright colours. That peculiar and cruel shade of blue satin that sets one’s teeth on edge.’
    ‘And what about him? Herr Willi?’
    The same. A rather average Teutonic type. Blond and ordinary, except for a pair of very pale blue eyes that somehow gave you the impression that they could bore holes through the side of a battle—
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    ship. A deceptive sort of chap. The kind who would always choose to be the power behind the throne rather than the man who sits on it.’
    Stella said: ‘Well, I’ve never been so thrilled in my life! I shall be able to dine out on this for the rest of my days. Robert, tell the waiter we’ll have our coffee in the hall, will you, darling? Coming, Miranda?’
    ‘•&
     
    The train rocked and swayed to the clattering rhythm of the iron wheels, but Stella did not hear them for she was already asleep. She had borrowed two capsules of sleeping powders from Brigadier Brindley, who apparently never travelled without them, and these, combined with fatigue and the emotions of the earlier evening, had sent her into deep and dreamless sleep barely a minute or so after her head had touched the pillow. She had taken the upper berth, and the dim glow of the small reading-light at the head of Robert’s berth below faintly illuminated her face and the blond waves of hair that were as neatly pinned for the night as though she had been in her own bedroom at Mallow.
    Robert stood looking at her for a moment, swaying to the swing of the train. In that dim light she appeared strangely young and exhausted. Poor SteP, thought Robert, how she does hate it! But there was nothing he could do about it. He could not, as Stella wished, leave the Army. It was the only profession he knew and he had few illusions as to his abilities. If I’m lucky, thought Robert dispassionately, I may be able to retire as substantive lieutenantcolonel - but only if I’m lucky. That’s about as far as I shall get. But if I chucked the Army now and tried for a civil job, I should probably end up as an office boy or a tout for vacuum cleaners. Stella doesn’t understand. I’d retire tomorrow and try and farm the place myself, if we had the money. But we haven’t, and that’s all there is to it. It’s a pity she hates this sort of life; it’s not a bad one really, but I suppose you have to have some sort of vocation or a military background to enable you to follow the drum and like
    it.
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    He yawned tiredly and sat down on the edge of his berth to remove his slippers. He had not realized that the Pages would be on the same train. A bit awkward, their being in Berlin. He would have to be careful. Sally was a sweet creature, but … Robert wriggled in between the sheets and switched off the light
    Fancy meeting old Brindley again! He hadn’t seen him for over eight years - or was it nine? Not since before his father had been killed on the Anzio beaches. Queer story that. It had given Miranda a bit of a jolt. A fortune in diamonds, lost and perhaps still unclaimed. He could do with a handful of diamonds himself … and who couldn’t?
    In the compartment next door Mademoiselle Beljame lifted a woollen dressinggown of Edwardian design from an aged Gladstone bag, moving quietly so as not to wake Lottie who lay in the shadows of the upper berth. A flannel nightdress followed, and a pair of hand-knitted slippers. Mademoiselle laid them out upon the berth and half filled the small washbasin with warm water. The
    water sloshed to and fro with the movement of the train and made
    a soft, slapping sound that provided a counterpoint to the squeaks and rattles of the train. Mademoiselle peered at her watch and then held it to her ear to make sure that it was