Margaret’s family had spent a quiet Christmas, for her brother had been unable to get leave and they had as yet no friends in London except Mrs Piper, who was busy with her own family’s Christmas plans, while Mr Steggles’s journalist friend, Dick Fletcher, was working over most of the holiday. Margaret had lunched with Zita at the Corner House as arranged, but Zita was in a hurry to meet her latest boy friend, with whom she was to spend her afternoon off, and amid the noise of chattering foreign voices in the Old Vienna Café they had almost to shout to make one another hear, and Margaret for her part said nothing but commonplaces, listening to Zita’s shrieked account of her latest conquest with a fixed smile and a frequently repeated nod which did not, she felt, much advance their friendship. She had made for Zita a little purse of bright felt, and was rather satisfied with her work, but late on Christmas Eve there arrived for herself an enormous handbag of black, green and yellow tie-silk, made with professional exaggeration and finish by Zita, and this made her dissatisfied with her own small offering.
