was a compliment and Anna smiled dutifully, but the woman was suddenly struck by another thought.
“What about the war?” she cried. “You’re in enemy country!”
Damn, thought Anna, why did I ever start this?
She tried to explain as patiently as she could. “We’re against Germany,” she said. “We want the English to win.”
“Against your own country?” said the woman.
“We don’t feel that it is our country any more,” began Anna, but the tweedy woman had become offended with the whole conversation.
“I could have sworn you were English,” she said reproachfully and buried herself in a copy of Country Life.
Anna stared out at the grey landscape rolling past the spattered window. It was ridiculous, but she felt put out. Why couldn’t she just have said she came from London as usual? Max would never have made such a mistake. This whole expedition is going to be a disaster, she thought.
When the train finally drew into the station at Cambridge her worst suspicions seemed to be confirmed. She stood on the platform with an icy wind blowing straight down it, and Max was nowhere to be seen. But then he appeared from behind a corner, breathless and with his gown flying behind him.
“Sorry,” he said. “I had a lecture.” He looked at the scarlet coat which Mrs Bartholomew had lent her. “That’s very dashing,” he said. “Judy’s or Jinny’s?”
“Jinny’s,” said Anna and felt better.
He picked up her case and hustled her out of the station.
“I hope you’ve brought a thick woollen nightie as well,” he said. “Your lodgings are somewhat cool.”
They turned out to have no heating at all – a vast, icy cave of a room – but it was not far from his own and the landlady promised to put a hot-water bottle in her bed at night. While Anna was tidying herself she tried to imagine the tweedy woman spending a night there and decided that her Cambridge weekends must have been very different. Max paid for the room – bed and breakfast cost ten shillings – and then they set off to walk through the town.
By now the rain had stopped, but there were still patches of water everywhere. The sky above the rooftops was wet and grey with shambling clouds which thinned occasionally to shimmer in half-hearted sunlight. They crossed the marketplace, picking their way between shoppers and dripping tarpaulins, and then they were suddenly engulfed by a crowd of undergraduates. The High Street was filled with them. They were splashing through the puddles on their bicycles and pushing along the pavement in noisy groups. There were black gowns everywhere, and long striped scarves, and everyone seemed to be talking, or shouting greetings to friends across the road. Several of them waved to Max, who seemed to be very much at home among them, and Anna thought what fun it must be to belong here.
Every so often, between greetings, he pointed out a landmark through the turmoil – a building, an ancient bit of wall, a cloistered passage where, centuries ago, someone had walked, a seat where someone else had written a poem. The stone of which they were made was the same colour as the sky and looked as though it had been there forever.
In the doorway of a tea-shop Max was accosted by two gowned figures.
“Discovered at last!” cried one. “And with a strange woman!”
“A strange scarlet woman,” said the other, pointing to Anna’s coat.
“Don’t be an idiot,” said Max. “This is my sister, Anna. And these are George and Bill who are having lunch with us.”
Anna remembered hearing about George who had been to school with Max. He was a good foot taller than herself, so that she would have had to throw back her head to see what he looked like. Bill’s face was more within range and looked pleasant and ordinary. They pushed their way through the crowded shop to a table in the corner. As they sat down George’s face sank into view and turned out to be cheerful, with an engaging look of permanent astonishment.
“Are you really his sister?” he asked. “I mean, if you had to be somebody’s sister, surely you could have found someone better than old Max here?”
“With his lecherous ways—”
“And his boots so stout—”
“And his eyes which swivel round about—”
“And the horrible way his ears stick out!” George finished triumphantly.
Anna stared at them in confusion. Had they just made that up? Or was it some kind of English verse that everyone except her knew?
George was leaning towards her.
“Surely, Anna – I trust I may call you Anna – surely you could have found someone more suitable?”
She would have to say something. “I think –” she began, but what did she think? At last she brought out, “I think Max is very nice.” She was blushing as usual.
“Loyal,” said George.
“And comely,” said Bill. “Wouldn’t you say comely, George?”
“Definitely comely,” said George.
They were off again and she found that all that was required of her was to laugh, which was easy. They ate baked beans on toast followed by doughnuts and cups of strong tea. Bill tried to wheedle an extra spoonful of sugar out of the waitress, but she refused.
“Don’t you know that there’s a war on?” she said, and Bill pretended to be amazed and cried, “No one told me – how ghastly!” and made so much noise that she gave him some sugar just to stop him.
“You young gentlemen are so insinuating,” she said, snatching the sugar bowl away and, as an afterthought, “I don’t know what the Government would say.”
The idea of the Government worrying about Bill’s extra teaspoonful of sugar was so remarkable that George, Bill and Max all needed another doughnut to get over it.
Anna watched them admiringly. How witty they were, she thought, and how handsome, and how English – and how strange to see Max virtually indistinguishable from the other two.
“Actually it’s funny,” said George. “That business of ‘Don’t you know that there’s a war on’. It doesn’t really seem as though there were, does it?”
“No,” said Max. “I don’t know what I thought it would be like if there was a war, but you’d imagine something more – well, urgent.”
Bill nodded. “When you think about the last one. All those people being killed.”
There was a pause.
Anna took a deep breath and decided to contribute to the conversation. “When I was small,” she said, “I was always very glad that I was a girl.”
They stared at her. Max frowned slightly. She’d made a mess of it as usual.
“Because of wars,” she explained. “Because girls couldn’t
