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your writing book. The teacher said that if he ever behaved like that again she would send him to the Headmaster. 'See if I care,' he said. So the teacher said that if he ever behaved like that again she would make him do sums instead of painting and drawing. Out came his lower lip, but he stayed silent.
    When Audrey told him how difficult she found school now that she had to do real lessons, and rolled her eyes and said that she just could not do sums, Patrick said that he found everything easy.
    'Lumme,' said Audrey. It was less in admiration than in pity. Why go to school then? she wondered. Was life supposed to be easy? She didn't think so. Whenever her father or mother said phrases concerning Easy, they were said with contempt:
    'Oh they've got it easy'
    Or 'Easy come, easy go.'
    Or (of the Duchess of Windsor, a continuing thorn in her mother's side living it up in Paris) 'She's just an easy woman.'
    So it couldn't be right. Much as Audrey liked the sound of it. An easy woman, after all, sounded much nicer than a hard one.
    'Go on with you ’ she said to Patrick, 'you can't only do everything you like.'
    'Yes I can,' he said. 'And what I don't like doing,' he added, 'I don't.'
    Patrick, she decided, obviously had no idea. Something stirred in her Little Girl's heart. If you only did the things you wanted to do, and left undone the things you ought to do, the things they told you, repeatedly, you ought to do, you wouldn't get very far in this life. She was sure of that. She had been told it often enough. She said 'Lumme' again, a little more softly, and then, 'You be careful, Patrick,' and gave him a gentle push. He pushed her back, and she fell over. Easily.
    3
    A Lesson in Bridge Building
    Several types of bridge structure have come down to us from ancient civilisations, including timber-corbelled bridges formed from inverted stacks of logs, which still exist in China and eastern Asia and have no modern counterpart ... These types are unequivocally similar to Roman examples providing evidence of communication and trade, or perhaps correspondences, between opposite ends of the ancient world. Matthew Wells, 30 Bridges
    We crossed (to Rome) on the Ponte Molle, formerly called the Ponte Milvius ... This bridge was built by Aemelious Censor ... it was the road by which so many heroes returned with conquest to their country; by which so many kings were led captive to Rome; and by which so many ambassadors of so many kingdoms approached the seat of empire ... to sue for the protection of Rome ... Nothing of the ancient bridge remains but the piles; nor is there anything in the structure of this, or of the other five bridges over the Tyber, that deserves attention. Tobias Smollett, Letter XXIX, Travels through France and Italy , 1766
    At Dolly's insistence, Florence took Patrick to London to visit Audrey for her eighth birthday. Audrey was the same height as Patrick now, and nothing chubby about her. She was a romping, cheery little girl, whose baby brother was in awe of her. 'She's an independent little miss,' said her mother very proudly, as she scooped up her baby son and held him close. "This one's much whinier.' The baby boy in question might, thought Florence, half with envy and half with contempt, be a bit less whiny if his mother wasn't always picking him up and carrying him. Just as well she did not say so, for Dolly would have applied her favourite cutting retort: Pot calling the Kettle, I think ...
    Florence was not altogether pleased with the way the friendship between little girl and little boy was developing. Already Dolly had suggested that Patrick might come down to London to stay on his own with them. Florence watched Little Audrey's vest and knickers flicker quick and sure in amongst the branches of the apple tree while Patrick stood below looking up. The rain, or perhaps the dew, had left droplets on the spiders' webs that hung and trembled beneath Little Audrey's surefooted climb. Patrick stared, apparently