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discipline of the law, a surgeon in his white coat—in a shaking world. A man in command of himself. Strong perfectly articulated hands enlaced at rest on his knees.
    â€”It was unbearable. You should go—no, don’t, don’t go, it’s what no-one’s meant to see, how can I say, the processes, what happens after death and it’s supposed to be buried away, but it’s all there—living. The babies just born and that means beginning to die, there in front of you.—
    In profile she saw his mouth drawn stiffly, eyebrows contracted. That he did not look at her made it possible for her to control the stupid, useless indulgence of tears.
    He picked up his glass and drank, then stirred slightly, towards her.—I told you not to walk out because of land mines still there, my uncle’s place. His youngest was home for school holidays and went with his dog to shoot a bird for his mother’s pot and he was blown up. Both legs gone. Sixteen years. He died. They can’t plant their fields.—
    When the man had left she didn’t know whether he had meant to reproach her weakness, or comfort her with the
proof—seen it for herself—that the old couple continues to live surrounded by the Death that had killed their son, lying in wait for them to step upon it.
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    The tour of the WHO representative ended. Roberta Blayne and her Administrator took up their usual activities until the next partner in development came. She was doing her job. In the social life promoted by Flora Henderson beyond official entertaining and being entertained (enough, enough aidshoptalk) the bachelor woman was always in the company of couples. She danced with other women’s husbands; no woman seemed to fear her. She couldn’t consider herself lonely, and the work was among the most fulfilling she had ever been assigned to, since Alan Henderson used her particularly in meetings where, in accordance with the Agency’s Mission Statement, local communities’ ideas of what they most needed—dams, access roads to markets, chicks and fingerlings to begin poultry- or fish-farming, roofing and desks for a new school—were to be joint projects with them. Many of those chosen by people to speak for them were women; somehow she created confidence: surely a woman would listen to them?—but the men respected her, too, an official position counters many traditional prejudices. Her Administrator would remark to Government officials, Roberta’s learning the language, you know, often she doesn’t need an interpreter! She would protest—she certainly did! But the fact that his Assistant was taking the trouble, in a tour of duty that lasts only a couple of years, to learn the main language of the country reflected well upon the Agency. Often the community would give her some small gift (no vicuna coat bribe—the Agency allowed acceptance as a token of trust)—a carved wooden spoon,
woven straw bags, a clay pot; the house she’d been assigned to began to take on the signs of homely possession that come with objects which have their modest personal history.
    The black car of the luxury model provided for the second echelons of Government office-bearers was in the yard—perhaps once a week, could be any day. The driver and bodyguards installed in the kitchen.
    The Deputy-Director of Land Affairs was the one acquaintance among many in her job (she knew their names, faces round conference tables, gossip about them, by now) who had become a special kind of acquaintance; his presence at least claimed that. They progressed from exchanges and courteous argument about current events in the country and the continent, inevitably, as people do when such talk runs out, to link observations from the past: when I was young, when I was a kid, I remember I thought it would be, it was … and to offer experiences of childhood background. Without any confidentiality, of course. These