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Driving up the hill out of Porthkerris, Virginia looked back and saw the lights of the town twinkling far below, the ink-black waters of the harbour brimming with shimmering reflections. Across the bay, from the distant headland, the lighthouse sent its warning signal. A flash. A pause. A flash. A longer pause. Be careful. There's danger.
    The evening ahead seemed full of possibilities. Suddenly excited, Virginia turned and leaned forward, resting her chin on crossed arms on the back of Alice's seat. The unpremeditated gesture was clumsy and spontaneous, a reflection of natural high spirits that were normally battened firmly down under the influence of a domineering mother.
    "Alice, where is this place we're going?"
    "Penfolda. It's a farm, just this side of Lanyon."
    "Who lives there?"
    "Mrs. Philips. She's a widow. And her son Eustace."
    "What does he do?"
    "He farms, silly. I told you it was a farm."
    "Are they friends of the Barnets?"
    "I suppose they must be. A lot of artists live out around this part of the world. Though I've no idea how they could ever have met."
    Tom said, "Probably at The Mermaid's."
    "What's The Mermaid's?" Virginia asked.
    "The Mermaid's Arms, the pub in Lanyon. On a Saturday night all the world and his wife go there for a drink and a get-together."
    "Who else will be at the party?"
    "Our guess is probably as good as yours."
    "Haven't you any idea?"
    "Well . . ."Alice did her best.". . . Artists and writers and poets and hippies and drop-outs and farmers and perhaps one or two rather boring and conventional people like us."
    Virginia gave her a hug. "You're not boring or conventional. You're super."
    "You may not think we're quite so super at the end of the evening. You may hate it, so grit your teeth and reserve your judgment."
    Virginia sat back, in the darkness of the car, hugging herself. I shan't hate it.
    There were headlights like fireflies, coming from all directions, converging on Penfolda. From the road the farmhouse could be seen to be blazing with light. They joined the queue of assorted vehicles which bumped and groaned their way down a narrow, broken land and eventually were directed into a farmyard which had been turned temporarily into a car park. The air was full of voices and laughter as friends greeted friends, and already a steady trickle of people were making their way over a stone wall and down over the pasture fields towards the cliffs. Some were wrapped in rugs, some carried old-fashioned lanterns, some—Virginia was glad all over again that her mother had not come—a clanking bottle or two.
    Someone said, "Tom! What are you doing here?", and Tom and Alice dropped back to wait for their friends, and Virginia went on, loving the feeling of being alone. All about her the soft, dark air smelled of peat and sea-wrack and wood-smoke. The sky was not yet empty of light and the sea was of so dark a blue that it was almost black. She went through a gap in a wall and saw, below her, at the bottom of the field, the golden flames of the fire, already ringed with lanterns and the shapes and shadows of about thirty people. As she came closer, faces sprang suddenly into focus, illuminated in firelight, laughing and talking, everybody knowing everybody. There was a barrel of beer, propped on a wooden stand, from which brimming glasses were being continually filled, and there was the smell of potatoes cooking and burning fat, and somebody had brought a guitar and begun to play and gradually a few people gathered about him and raised uncertain voices in song.
There is a ship
And she sails the sea,
She's loaded deep
As deep can be.
But not as deep
As the love I'm in . . .
    A young man, running to pass Virginia, stumbled in the dusk and bumped into her. "Sorry." He grabbed her arm, as much to steady himself as her. He held his lantern high, the light in her face. "Who are you?"
    "Virginia."
    "Virginia who?"
    "Virginia Parsons."
    He had long hair and a band around his forehead and looked like