He was a sidesman in the church which Mrs Graham attended, and they had known each other since she was a little girl. A couple of years ago he had let their house for them, and she had taken her mother down to the sea for three months. It had not been a very successful experiment, and she had no wish to repeat it. She bowed, gave him a grave smile and was about to pass on, when he said,

‘Oh, Miss Graham – good morning. How very fortunate, running into you like this. Could you spare me a moment?’

She said, ‘Well…’ and found herself being ushered across the threshold, through the outer office, and along the narrow passage which led to his private room. The house was an old one. There were two meaningless and inconvenient steps down at one end of the passage and two more up at the other end, but the room itself looked pleasantly out upon a garden full of old-fashioned flowers. As she sat facing Mr Martin across his writing-table she could see a round bed full of roses set in a square of crazy paving, and beyond it two wide borders full of phlox, helenium, carnations and gladioli, with a paved path running between them. Mr Martin fancied himself as a gardener. His own garden up the hill was a show piece, and nothing pleased him better than to hear people stop and admire it as they went by. He beamed at Althea and said,

‘Now I expect you are wondering why I wanted to see you.’

‘Well, yes…’

He leaned back in his chair and put his hands together in a professional manner.

‘Of course I could have rung you up, but I didn’t want to make it too formal, if you know what I mean.’

Since she hadn’t the least idea, she said nothing at all. After a moment he went on again.

‘Well, as a matter of fact, I have had a client making inquiries about house property in this neighbourhood, and it did just cross my mind to wonder whether you would be interested.’