An hour later she stretched out a bare arm and tickled my ear and said:

‘Would you consider marrying me?’

‘It wouldn’t last six months.’

‘Well, for God’s sake,’ she said, ‘suppose it didn’t. Wouldn’t it be worth it? What do you expect from life – full coverage against all possible risks?’

‘ I’m forty-two years old. I’m spoilt by independence…You’re spoiled a little – not too much – by money.’

‘I’m thirty-six. It’s no disgrace to have money and no disgrace to marry it. Most of us who have it don’t deserve it and don’t know how to behave with it. But it won’t be long. We’ll have another war and at the end of that nobody will have any money – except the crooks and the chisellers. We’ll all be taxed to nothing, the rest of us.’

I stroked her hair and wound some of it around my finger. ‘You may be right.’

‘We could fly to Paris and have a wonderful time.’ She raised herself on an elbow and looked down at me. I could see the shine of her eyes but I couldn’t read her expression. ‘Do you have something against marriage?’

‘For two people in a hundred it’s wonderful. The rest just work at it. After twenty years all the guy has left is a work bench in a garage. American girls are terrific. American wives take in too damn much territory. Besides –’

‘I want some champagne.’