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affectionate glance at her grandchild. ‘She’s such a capable girl. She even made these pretty bright chair covers.’
    ‘Really? How enterprising. You have an expert eye for colour, Miss Shannon.’ From across the room, Simon Gilchrist somehow forced Jenny to meet his eyes. ‘I shall have to enlist your advice when I come to decorating my own house.’
    The cool effrontery of such a statement, when he knew how intensely she disliked him, made Jenny seethe afresh.
    But before she could think of a suitably caustic retort, he had turned to her grandfather with an inquiry about the private vault in the churchyard.
    After tea, the old people took him round the garden, and he did not come into the house again. From her bedroom window, Jenny saw that he had left his car in the lane at the rear of the Rectory, which was why she had had no warning that he was visiting them.
    Later on that evening, while Jenny was washing up the supper dishes and her grandmother was drying them, Mrs.
    Shannon said suddenly, ‘Mr. Gilchrist reminds me of a young man I used to know before I met your grandfather. I remember Charles had dark hair, and just the same sort of smile as Mr. Gilchrist. He had a rather bad reputation, and somehow that made him all the more attractive. One always had the feeling that he might say or do something quite shocking, and I’m sorry to say that I found it rather an enjoyable sensation. By comparison, the other young men I knew seemed so dull.’
    Jenny could not help smiling. ‘I didn’t know you had a shady past, Granny.’
    ‘Oh, I haven’t, my dear. I was much too sheltered to have a chance to misbehave myself. But there was one occasion when I think Charles intended to kiss me, if I hadn’t been a coward and run away from him. You see, for a time I thought I was in love with him, and I believe he was quite fond of me. But even if he had proposed, my parents would never have consented. And when I met John I soon realized that my feeling for Charles had been only a foolish infatuation.’ She paused, her thoughts far away. ‘But I must admit there were times when I couldn’t help wishing I had let Charles kiss me - just once.’
    ‘What happened to him?’ Jenny asked.
    ‘Oh, he went to the devil, as they used to say in those days.’
    ‘Perhaps he really loved you,’ Jenny suggested.
    ‘I very much doubt it, dear. He was a born philanderer.
    Charming susceptible young women was his hobby. They say a reformed rake makes a better husband than a man who has never sown any wild oats, but I don’t think it’s true. Oh, I’ve just remembered! – Could you pop across to Mrs. Langdon with those knitted squares which Miss Johnson brought round after lunch. I was going to call on Mrs. Langdon when Mr. Gilchrist arrived and put it right out of my head, and I know she’s waiting for some more squares to finish her Red Cross blanket.’
    The Langdons lived in one of five tall Georgian houses on the south side of the green from where the village took its name. The front doors of the houses opened directly on to the pavement, but the houses had long walled gardens behind them, with gates leading into Stable Lane.
    Jenny went round by the back way and found Mrs.

    Langdon enjoying the late evening sunlight in a chair under the mulberry tree.
    ‘Hello, Jenny dear. How are you? Do you like marrons glaces? My sister sent this great big box of them for my birthday. Try one.’ Mrs. Langdon laid down her needlework, and gestured with her spectacles at the box on the teak garden table.
    Jenny explained her mission, and they talked about the forthcoming sale of work for some minutes until the older woman suddenly changed the subject by asking, ‘Jenny, have you and James had a row about something?’
    ‘A row? No - why should we?’ Jenny said blankly.
    Mrs. Langdon sighed and made an adjustment to the cushion at the small of her back. ‘Oh, dear, this is rather difficult,’ she said, frowning ‘I do try not