“Thank you, Elvira,” Christine said when the tray was in place. The girl departed without a word, casting a disdainful backwards glance at the frayed jacket sleeves, the stained fingers. Christine was now determined to be especially kind to him.

“You are very rich,” he said.

“No,” Christine protested, shaking her head, “we’re not.” She had never thought of her family as rich; it was one of her father’s sayings that nobody made any money with the Government.

“Yes,” he repeated, “you are very rich.” He sat back in his lawn chair, gazing about him as though dazed.

Christine set his cup of tea in front of him. She wasn’t in the habit of paying much attention to the house or the garden; they were nothing special, far from being the largest on the street; other people took care of them. But now she looked where he was looking, seeing it all as though from a different height: the long expanses, the border flowers blazing in the early-summer sunlight, the flagged patio and walks, the high walls and the silence.

He came back to her face, sighing a little. “My English is not good,” he said, “but I improve.”

“You do,” Christine said, nodding encouragement.

He took sips of his tea, quickly and tenderly as though afraid of injuring the cup. “I like to stay here.”

Christine passed him the cakes. He took only one, making a slight face as he ate it; but he had several more cups of tea while she finished the cakes. She managed to find out from him that he had come over on a church fellowship– she could not decode the denomination—and was studying Philosophy or Theology, or possibly both. She was feeling well-disposed towards him: he had behaved himself, he had caused her no inconvenience.

The teapot was at last empty. He sat up straight in his chair, as though alerted by a soundless gong. “You look this way, please,” he said. Christine saw that he had placed his miniature camera on the stone sundial her mother had shipped back from England two years before. He wanted to take her picture. She was flattered, and settled herself to pose, smiling evenly.