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    They would dream, half aloud, of chesterfield settees.
    L'Express would dream with them. They would spend a large part of their holidays doing the country-house auctions; there, at bargain prices, they acquired pewter, straw- bottomed chairs, glasses that asked to be drunk from, horn-handled knives, shiny bowls which they made into precious ashtrays. All these things, they knew, had been, or would be mentioned in the L'Express.
    Their actual purchasing practice, however, was quite significantly different from the shopping habits put forward by L'Express. They were not yet quite "settled down" and, although their "executive" status was broadly acknowledged, they did not enjoy the job security or the bonus payments or the salary enhancements of permanent staff under contract. L'Express suggested, in that case, by way of pleasant but inexpensive boutiques (the boss is a pal, he'll give you a drink and an open sandwich whilst you're making up your mind), little businesses where fashion had required, in order to create an appropriate impression, a thoroughgoing improvement of all previous fixtures and fittings: whitewashed walls were indispensable, dark brown carpeting a necessity, which could be replaced only by a mosaic of antiquated floor tiles of different kinds; exposed beams were obligatory, and little internal staircases, real fireplaces with a fire burning, rustic or (even better) Provençal furniture were highly recommended. These conversions which were spreading across Paris and affecting, indiscriminately, bookshops, art galleries, haberdashers', novelty and furniture stores, and even grocers' shops (it was not uncommon to see some formerly down-at-heel corner-shop grocer turn into a Cheese Consultant complete with a blue apron giving him a very expert air, and his shop acquire roof-beams and straw decking . . . ), such conversions, therefore, brought more or less legitimately in their wake a rise in prices such that the purchase of a raw-wool, hand-printed dress, of a cashmere twinset woven by a blind Orkney crofter (exclusive genuine vegetable-dyed hand-spun hand-woven) or of a sumptuous jersey wool and leather jacket ( for weekend wear, for hunting, for driving) proved permanently impossible. They would eye the wares of antique-dealers closely, but to furnish their flat they actually relied on country sales or the less-publicised auctions at Drouot (and even there they went less often than they would have liked); similarly, all of them only enlarged their stock of clothes by assiduous excursions to the Flea Market or, twice a year, to jumble sales organised by English ladies in aid of the Saint George's English Church's charitable works, where there were plenty of diplomats' cast-offs, in perfectly acceptable condition of course. Often they felt awkward about it: they would have to push their way through a milling crowd and rummage through piles of ghastly stuff - the taste of the English is not all it's cracked up to be - before unearthing a splendid tie, no doubt too frivolous for an Embassy under-secretary, or a shirt that had once been exquisite, or a skirt that would just need taking up. But, of course, it was that or nothing: the incommensurability, perceptible in every domain, between the quality of their taste in clothing (nothing was too fine for them) and the amount of money they normally had available was an obvious, if ultimately secondary, sign of their material situation. They were not the only ones; rather than shop at the sales, which happened everywhere, three times a year, they preferred to buy second-hand. In the world that was theirs it was almost a regulation always to wish for more than you could have. It was not they who had