‘Ah, Susan Johnny is a photographer, in his spare time, if he ever gets any.’ Susan smiled. She was suffering badly by now, desperate to escape the stresses of the supper and go up to her room. She was a young looking seventeen year-old and in the half-light of Mrs Lewis’s dinner table candles, passed for younger, possibly sixteen. Possibly younger. Johnny looked at her curiously.

‘Are you visiting Calcutta? At school in Darjeeling?’

If this was meant to put her at ease it didn’t, and her eyes watered as Mrs Lewis gasped in a barely concealed delight at his mistake. Johnny immediately realised his error and did all he could he make her feel comfortable for the rest of the evening.

He had brought with him (by accident, as he’d come straight from playing tennis at the club) his photographs from his trip to Ceylon. There were glorious local beaches and natives but most of them were of children. ‘They’re the most wonderful subject,’ he said. ‘So open and fresh. And they stay still and don’t wriggle when you want to take the picture.’

‘You should have an exhibition...’ managed Susan, about the only comment she’d made for a while.

‘Indeed I should. What a wonderful idea. Would you come?’ She blushed.

‘I’m not entirely sure where I will be...’

The conversation moved on. Cars, homes, servants, the city, who was leaving, who was new.

‘Well, I have heard there’s a very risqué young woman just arrived. A brand new girl in town,’ said Mrs Lewis. ‘Brand spanking new she sounds. From Bombay where she made quite a stir. Have you heard this Johnny?’

‘I’m not at all sure. Tell me more and I’ll see.’

‘A Duchess’s daughter.’

A murmur went round the table. ‘A Duchess’s daughter in Cal?’

‘She doesn’t use a title. Maybe she’s incognito. In fact she has a very strange name altogether. Foreign sounding though I don’t believe she is foreign herself. How very confusing. I don’t like being confused, do you Johnny?’