With her back to the door she faced them. One or two made unsuccessful attempts to mount and she tried to quell them, collectively, with an imperious glare. Such was the din they raised that she did not hear the door open. “You are in trouble!” said a voice behind her. “Nip in, won’t you, while I shut the door. Be off, birds.”

The visitor was grasped, turned about and smartly pulled across the threshold. The door slammed behind her and she found herself face to face with a thin ginger-haired lady who stared at her in watery surprise.

“Yes?” said the lady. “Yes, well, I don’t think — and in any case, what weather!”

“Dame Alice Mardian?”

“My great-aunt. She’s ninety-four and I don’t think —”

With an important gesture the visitor threw back her cloak, explored an inner pocket and produced a card.

“This is, of course, a surprise,” she said. “Perhaps I should have written first, but I must tell you — frankly, frankly — that I was so transported with curiosity — no, not that, not curiosity — rather, with the zest of the hunter, that I could not contain myself. Not for another day. Another hour even!” She checked. Her chin trembled. “If you will glance at the card,” she said. Dimly, the other did so.

“Oh dear!” said the ginger-haired lady and added, “But in any case come in, of course.” She led the way from a hall that was scarcely less cold than the landscape outside into a drawing-room that was, if anything, more so. It was jammed up with objects. Mediocre portraits reached from the ceiling to the floor, tables were smothered in photographs and ornaments, statuettes peered over each other’s shoulders. On a vast hearth dwindled a shamefaced little fire.