She managed to get the glass for a moment while she pulled on the small dark turban which went with her suit, and there she was-Cinderella after the last stroke of twelve-no features, no bloom, no colour, except for the lipstick which brightened her mouth. It was too bright really, but you had to make up a bit extra for a show. Jeremy would look sideways and say things about pillar-boxes. Well, let him-she didn’t care.

She came out on to the street and found it icy cold. It was going to freeze quite hard. She exchanged good-nights with Gloria and Daphne and took her way to the end of the street. Sometimes Jeremy met her there, but he wouldn’t tonight because of the show. There just wasn’t any saying how long it would go on.

She turned the corner, and he loomed up out of a doorway. It was heartening when you had been feeling like Cinderella. He slipped his hand inside her arm, and she said,

“Oh, you shouldn’t have come!”

Jeremy Taverner said, “Don’t be silly! How did it go?”

“Two of my things sold. That puts my stock up.”

“The usual frightful women?”

“They’re not all frightful.”

“I don’t know how you stand it.”

“Well, I don’t see there’s anything else I could do which I shouldn’t hate a good deal worse.”

“As?”

“Serving in a shop-nursemaid-companion-”

“There are lots of jobs for women.”

“Darling, I’m not trained for any of them.”

He said in an angry voice,

“Don’t call me darling!”

“Did I?”

“You did. I don’t like it.”

She laughed easily.

“It doesn’t mean anything-one does it all the time. It just slipped out.”

He said still more angrily,

“That’s why!”

The hand inside her arm gripped her quite painfully. She said,

“Darling, you’re pinching me!” Then, with a sudden change of voice and manner, “Don’t be a tiresome toad, because I want to talk to you-I really do.”