Suddenly my father coughed apologetically and sat up.

‘Someone is coming to stay,’ he announced.

I shut my eyes tightly. We were too peaceful, it just couldn’t last!

‘Hurry up and tell us who it is!’ cried Elsa, always avid for gossip.

‘Anne Larsen,’ said my father and he turned towards me.

I could hardly believe my ears. Anne was the last person I would have thought of. She had been a friend of my mother’s, and had very little connexion with my father. But all the same, when I left school two years before and my father was at his wits’ end about me, he had asked her to take me in hand. Within a week she had dressed me in the right clothes and taught me something of life. I remember thinking her the most wonderful person and being quite embarrassingly fond of her, but she soon found me a young man to whom I could transfer my affections. To her I owed my first glimpse of elegance and my first flirtation, and I was very grateful. At forty-two she was a most attractive woman, much sought after, with a beautiful face, proud, tired, and indifferent. This indifference was the only complaint one could make against her: she was amiable and distant. Everything about her denoted a strong will and an inner serenity which were disconcerting.