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Bertrand was all right, as also were Ted Bamford and Steve Brignall.

The colonel was on his way now to the blacksmith's house to tell Mrs.

Bamford the good news concerning her son.

The following week Bertrand Parley came home and Grace ran into him in the village street. He had an aura about him he had been in Dunkirk.

But to Grace there seemed to be only one apparent change in him: he had lost some flesh. His manner was still perky, even more so than usual.

In spite of the trouble he had caused her at Christmas she could not help laughing at him. It was odd but she found that she even liked him a little now. He was silly, he was harmless, he was what her Aunt Aggie had called him . a fathead.

Miss Shawcross, looking into the street through the side of the black-out blind which she kept permanently drawn, saw at that moment the vicar's wife laughing with Captain Parley. The vicar's wife laughed too loud, she thought; she did not seem to realise that she had a position to uphold. Miss Shawcross shook her head. Poor, poor vicar. Even in her most revealing moments Miss Shawcross never allowed herself to allude to the vicar as Donald.

It was that same afternoon that Miss Shawcross asked the vicar if he knew that Captain Parley was home. She had seen the Captain talking to Mrs. Rouse in the High Street.

A few days later Colonel Parley gave a small party, a sort of thanksgiving for the safe return of his son, and to it were invited the vicar and his wife. Grace knew that Donald would have liked to refuse the invitation but had been unable to see his way clear to do so, and she was well aware that his weather eye was on her from the moment they entered the Parleys' house. She smiled wryly to herself when, after a game of bridge had been proposed and two tables had been made up, she and Bertrand Parley were left adrift. She had refused Bertrand's invitation to play the piano, saying she had not kept up her practice and would rather not. But when he suggested they should look round the garden she accepted. He was not drunk tonight, he would not be silly.

She felt no compunction that Donald's bridge would be affected, and although she did not think the scene of New Year's morning would be enacted again she was quite prepared to undergo the same silent and censorious displeasure as that to which he had treated her for the most of January, for she preferred this to his jocular, bouncing, daddy-boy act.

Yet, being fair, she knew that the daddy act was not all pretence, far from it. He had a deep affection for the child; in fact she Could give it another name a possessive

love. On one occasion she had come across him holding the boy tightly to him with the child's head pressed closely into his shoulder. His own eyes were closed and on his face had been a look that had touched her and drew from her a surge of conscience, and for a moment she had wished that the child could have been his.

There were two results of her walk in the garden that night. The first: the disquieting knowledge that Bertrand Parley was really in love with her, yet he had not made love to her in any way. The odd thing was he hardly spoke to her once they had left the house, but while they sat on the garden seat he had looked at her in telling silence, then had abruptly got up and walked away.

The second: when Donald and she returned home, after a journey during which no word was exchanged. Donald went straight to his study and there must have exceeded his daily drop . for the following day she found that quite some inroad had been made into a fresh bottle of whisky.

Sometimes on a Sunday when she would listen to him expounding from the pulpit she would wonder how, in his own mind, he reconciled the fact that their well-stocked wine-cabinet was supplied by the black market.

Not through Mr. Barker at the Stag oh, no, that would never have done but through Uncle Ralph. Uncle Ralph had friends and could get most commodities that money could buy. Nor did Donald question that he always had butter on his bread and bacon every morning. No. No. Men weren't supposed to notice trifles like that, their minds were taken up with higher things, they just ate what was put in front of them.

She often smiled sadly to herself.

The months of summer wore away and so October came. The Battle of Britain had been won, "but night bombing was on in earnest. On the Monday night before the attempted raid on the aerodrome. Colonel Parley, Farmer Toole, Dr. Cooper, Mr. Thompson and ... Miss Shawcross came to the vicarage to hold a meeting regarding the coming influx of evacuees. They were to be mostly children from the shipping districts of the Tyne. Before the meeting was over Bertrand Parley called. He was in possession of a service car and had come to pick up his father.

The meeting in the study over, Donald, ahead of the others, opened the drawing-room door to see Bertrand Parley standing in front of Grace and to hear the tail-end of his words.

After an exchange of greetings, the committee broke up, and when they had all gone, Donald, without speaking or even looking at Grace, once again went to his study.

The next night the air-raid siren went at seven o'clock. They were sitting in the drawing-room at the time and the sound apparently startled Donald. From the look on his face he might never have heard an air-raid siren before. He had not left her for a moment since teatime and Grace had begun to puzzle over this. Usually, following tea, he went either down to the village or into his study. But this night he had sat with her, even followed her into the kitchen. And now when the sirens went he exclaimed aloud, "No! Oh no."

Before the wail had died away Grace had rushed upstairs and collected Stephen, and when she reached the kitchen Donald was waiting for her.

He had already donned his top coat and gas-mask. After switching off the lights he opened the door and guided her out and around the side of the house.

The night was black, but he did not switch on the torch until they reached the shelter, then he shone it on the steps for her to enter.

Once inside and the door closed, he switched on the light. Then, looking round, he said, "You

have everything. I'll have to go, you'll be all right? "

"Yes, yes, I'll be all right."

He seemed to be on the point of speaking again; instead he jerked his head with a half-angry helpless gesture and, turning from her, went up the steps.

She had reached out her hand to pick up a book from the top of the cupboard to take to the bunk with her when she heard the click, and her glance darted towards the steps and the cellar door. The sound was like the key being turned. She must have imagined it. Her hand had descended on the book when she swung round and went swiftly up the steps to the door and turned the knob. She knew that her face was registering blank amazement. Why had he locked the door? He had locked her in. She felt a slight tremor of panic rising in her. What had he locked the door for! What if a bomb dropped and she couldn't get out?

"Donald ... Donald!" She looked upwards, yelling at the ceiling which was the floor of | the hall.

"Donald ... I Donald ... I' He couldn't have gone away, he couldn't.

"Donald ... I Donald!" After a moment she tried the door again, shaking it viciously. Then slowly she walked down the steps.

"Mm... mm... Mumma." The child began to winge.

"Go to sleep, darling; it's all right, it was only Mummy calling."

"Mumma."

"There, there, don't cry. It's all right, it was only Mammy. Go to sleep. Ssh!" She sat patting Stephen, her eyes looking upwards. What had made him lock the door? He had been acting funny all evening, at least he hadn't acted to his usual pattern. Why had he sat with her?

He had never sat with her after tea, not even when they were first married. There had always been something he wanted to do about that time. Then the answer came to her. It came in the picture of his face as she had seen it in the drawing-room doorway last night when he stood looking at Bertrand Parley. Bertrand Parley's leave was up.

More for something to say than anything else she had asked him, "When do you go back?" and he had replied, "Tomorrow. Report Wednesday o-seven hundred." His pcular front was well in play again.

"But they don't get anything out of me, I travel in the small hours, so I needn't make a move until eight tomorrow night." Eight tomorrow night. No. No.

It was too funny. But she remembered Donald had gone straight into his study without a glance at her. He thought she had intended seeing Bertrand Parley off, so he had locked the door, locked her in here, and anything could happen. Didn't he realise that she couldn't possibly leave the child even if she wanted to? She sat down in the basket chair near the little table and, putting her elbow on it, rested her head on her hand.

The more she thought about the situation the more she was filled with anger . and then fear. She hated being locked in. As a child if she went home and found her mother out she would not lock herself in for safety but would open both the back and front doors, so leaving herself a way of escape. She had never been able to sleep in a room when the door was locked. She had never even locked her door against Donald, not that she had any need to.

It was about ten seconds to half past seven when she heard the sound of the planes and instinctively she knew they weren't ours. Their drone was heavy and different somehow. Arid then the first bomb dropped.

The sound of it crashing into the earth was like great teeth grinding down into cinder toffee, and as she flung herself from the chair on to the bunk over the child the light in the low ceiling flickered twice, then went out.

"Mumma ... Mumma ... Mumma."

"It's ... it's all right, darling. It's all right. Mammy's here."

Her voice was trembling, her whole body was trembling. Oh God! Oh God!

What if one fell on the house and she couldn't get out of the cellar?

There came now the distant sound of the pop-pop of antiaircraft guns, followed by the low, thick murmur of a plane seemingly crossing straight over the house. In the inky darkness she looked upwards, too petrified for a moment to move. Then the earth shuddered again.

"Mumma ... Mumma. Dadda ... Dadda. Stevie ... " It's . all right .

darling. Mam . Mammy's here. " She could hardly get the words through her chattering teeth.

There came more thick, dull droning, then the great tremor that ran through the earth seemed to run straight through her, and it was followed by another and another. They were bombing the village, the little village. Why the village? There was nothing in the village.

The aerodrome. They thought they were bombing the aerodrome.

Jesus . Jesus . she should pray, but she couldn't pray. She couldn't pray. If only there was somebody with her, somebody to speak to. Oh, Andrew! She didn't want to die without seeing Andrew. And the child.

0, God! Don't let anything happen to my child. If only she had a light. The candles of course, the candles.

"There, darling, lie still, lie still. Mammy's going to light the candles.

Mammy's going to make a light. There now. "

She moved backwards off the bunk and groped towards the top of the chest where the books were. There was a candle already in its holder next to the bookrack. With trembling fingers she lifted it up and groped round the broad saucer rim for matches. There were no matches on it. Her fingers, like a blind man's, spread over the books and over the top of the chest. When she had covered its entire surface the panic whirled through her body and corkscrewed through her head, and she only stopped herself from screaming aloud.

He couldn't have taken the matches, he couldn't have taken the matches.

She was on her, hands and knees feeling around the legs of the chest, around the floor. He couldn't have taken the matches. He was always picking up boxes of matches, but he couldn't have taken these matches, he couldn't. And he had gone off with the torch.

She remembered seeing that in his hand as he went up the steps.

He had locked her in, he had deliberately locked her and the child in, and they were bombing the village. But he couldn't have taken the matches.

"Andrew ... Andrew, he has taken the matches, I haven't got a light, I can't light the candle.. She was scrambling about on her hands and knees near the table now and she gripped at its thin leg with both hands and whimpered. Steady, steady. Don't scream. Go and lie down, put your face into the pillow, it will be like night. Go to sleep. In this instant there came another thud, and as the foundations of the house trembled she flung herself forward in the direction of the bunk, dashing her forehead into the woodwork.

"Mumma!"

As she smothered the child to her there came a different sound still it was that of a falling plane. As it screeched on its downward plunge it seemed so near that she drew her head right down between her shoulders as if avoiding contact with it. It was only a matter of seconds before she heard the crash but they appeared like long, long minutes to her.

Had it fallen in the wood? It had fallen somewhere near. People would soon be milling about and then she would shout and they would break the door open.

There was no sound of any kind now, not the sound of bombs or planes, or human footsteps. Nothing. She turned her eyes from the pillow and looked upwards.

The blackness was thick. She had heard of pit blackness which was darker than pitch blackness. This was the pit blackness that the miners had to endure when they were in a fall and the lights went out.

Oh God! If only somebody would come. They would all be in the village.

Had anyone been killed? Had Donald been killed? She hoped he had.

Yes, she did, she did. He had locked her in and taken the matches. Be quiet, don't say things like that, they're wicked. Well, wasn't he wicked? He was a walking hypocrite. She hoped . Be quiet! be quiet!

"Mumma! Mumma!"

"Don't cry, my love."

The child began to cry loudly now, and above his wailing she imagined she heard the sound of a car. She rose from the bunk and groped her way up the steps to II the door. After a moment of waiting and no further sound coming to her, she called, "Hello! Hello! Is there anyone there?" Only silence answered her, as deep and thick as the blackness about her. Suddenly she was thumping on the door with her fists, yelling, "Open the door! Open the door! Help! Help!" She thumped until her arms ached and she dropped on to her knees exhausted.