Nine Coaches Waiting

‘I can’t promise anything. All I can say is that we’ll try and compromise between what’s right and what’s best.’

the inspector’s manner with me was gentle and even respectful, and I found myself answering his questions readily and without any anxiety other than the dreadful obsessional one – the fox under my cloak that kept my eyes on the open door all through the half-hour or so of question and answer, and made my heart jump and jerk every time anyone passed

‘Léon liked you too. He said you were gallant. That was the word. He said: “She’s a gallant little devil and it’d be a pity if we had to bring her down.”’

Everybody needs a – a centre. Somewhere to go out from and come back to. And I suppose as you get older you enjoy the coming back more than the going out.’

I know what it was, of course. I’d lived with loneliness a long time. That was something which was always there … one learns to keep it at bay, there are times when one even enjoys it – but there are also times when a desperate self-sufficiency doesn’t quite suffice, and then the search for the anodyne begins … the radio, the dog, the shampoo, the

Her eyes as she smiled at me were friendly, almost warm, and for the first time since I had met her I saw charm in her – not the easy charm of the vivid personality, but the real and irresistible charm that reaches out halfway to meet you, assuring you that you are wanted and liked.

I didn’t feel it necessary to insist in front of the child that, but for the tumble, he would probably now be dead. But Madame de Valmy understood that. She was so white that I thought she would faint. The pale eyes, watching Philippe, held a look, unmistakably, of horror. So she did care after all, I thought, surprised and a little touched.

I was also making a grim little discovery that frightened me. The dreams might be moonshine, but the fact remained. I was in love with him. It hadn’t been the wine and the starlight and all the trappings of romance. It hadn’t even been the charm that he’d been so lavish with that night. Now I was undoubtedly sober and it was raining and the charm w

there used to be plenty of money, anyway.’ ‘There still is,’ I said, ‘or so it seems.’ ‘Yes. Things are waking up again, I gather. Two good vintages, and you get the roof repaired.