BY THE TIME the express reached the outskirts of London the rain that had threatened all afternoon was falling in earnest and Elinor Gray’s thoughts turned eagerly towards the warmth of Italian sunshine. Genoa, then the small fishing-port of Magnano, and after that remote Montecornazza on the rocky eastern part of the Riviera coast; that was to be the first part of their holiday. Later would come the more energetic sight-seeing, first Rome, then Perugia and Florence.
    She must have been smiling to herself because David leaned across the compartment and asked:
    “Pleasant thoughts?”
    This time Elinor smiled warmly at her husband.
    “I was thinking of sun and flowers and bright boats. All the fuss and last minute work seem well behind and I’m ready to enjoy myself.”
    David Gray settled once more into his corner.
    “I’m glad. Warm sunshine will be a pleasant change, and there’s no need for either of us to worry. The shop will be well looked after.”
    Elinor knew that, since a reliable friend of David’s, who was deeply interested in books and pictures, had agreed to take charge in their absence. But there always comes a time, usually on the every eve of a holiday, when one wishes that it was not taking place after all. A time when it seems that the packing and all the last minute jobs will
never be finished. Besides, she had had a commission to deal with before she could have an easy mind for holidays, and it had taken longer than she had expected.
    The weather in Lincolnshire had been shocking all through the early spring, and, though it was April 28th, the last few days had been icy cold, with strong winds and showers of hail and sleet. It had been weather in which it was almost impossible to imagine warm sunshine, and, at the last, it had seemed nearly too much trouble to leave their delightful old stone house, of which the shop was a part. So it was only now on their way to London, that Elinor felt the first real excitement.
    David Gray had given up teaching in a Grammar School in the North some years before Elinor had met him and had found a haven in the shop and house he had inherited from an uncle. He was a scholarly man, who had published one or two books on his own account, and he found selling books and a few well-chosen paintings far more to his taste than teaching. It gave him time to read and to get on with his writing, and he had managed well enough without women until he had met Elinor and the pair had fallen in love.
    Elinor was eight years younger and already a well-known artist, and her friends and relations had at first not thought much of the match. But David, as Elinor had almost immediately known, was the man for her, and they had been married less then six months after their first meeting.
    That had been two years before and they were still deeply happy. Elinor had continued to sell her drawings with even greater success than before, and it was for her sensitive sketches that she was best known, though she hoped to do some painting in Italy.
    She and David had not had a holiday together since their honeymoon in Cornwall, and the Italian tour had been partly Elinor’s idea and partly the doctor’s. David had had cold after cold during the bad winter, and, since there was enough money for travelling, it seemed a good idea to see the Riviera in the spring.
    So the plan had finally taken concrete form in a booking with Blue Dragon tours. Elinor had really wanted them to go alone, travelling out by slow train and staying at any place that attracted them, but David had said that it would be more of a rest if they put the whole thing in the hands of the Blue Dragon people, who were well-known for planning imaginative tours on a small scale.
    So they were to meet the courier and the rest of the party at Victoria for the Rome Express on the following morning, and Elinor was suddenly pleased to remember, as the train jerked its way slowly into King’s Cross Station, that Rose was going with them.
    Rose Welland was her niece, the daughter of her eldest sister, and both Elinor and David were fond of her. Rose was eighteen and had left school at Easter; an exceedingly pretty, if not over-sensible girl, for whom Elinor felt some respon­sibility. For Rose’s mother was a widow and Rose herself rather lacked the happiness to which her attractive face and pleasant nature seemed to entitle her. She had spent most of her later schooldays at a cheap, rather bad boarding-school, had never been abroad, and was now faced-with not the slightest preparation-with the prospect of earning her living.
    Elinor blamed her sister for struggling to keep Rose at school, when a commercial college at sixteen would probably have yielded better dividends.
    The train stopped with a jerk, and Elinor hastily straight­ened her smart little hat and gathered up her handbag and magazines.  The rain was drumming down steadily as their taxi carried them away from the station, but the feeling of happy anticipation remained.
    They reached their hotel and went into the cheerful warmth and light, and suddenly the Lincolnshire town seemed as far away as though they were already across the Channel.
    They were to meet the Blue Dragon party at half-past ten the next morning and there were no difficulties. Their cases were packed in time, and the Blue Dragon labels were in place. The hall porter called a taxi immediately and there were no traffic jams.
    Amazingly it was a sunny morning, though very cool, and the street traders’ barrows looked particularly vivid. The trees were in leaf in the Green Park and even the Daily Mail comment that the Channel was “slight” seemed a good omen.
    “Now it all depends on the rest of the party,” said Elinor. “Anyway, there’ll only be eleven or twelve besides our­selves and Rose.”
    Their instructions had been to meet near the barrier, and when the Grays followed their porter across the station they could see that already a small group of people had assem­bled, surrounded by cases that bore the distinctive Blue Dragon labels.
    “There’s Rose!” said David Gray, as a girl excitedly leaped over a suitcase and ran towards them. 
    “Oh, Uncle David! Aunt Elinor! I’ve been here hours! Well, ten minutes, at least. I’m so thrilled I hardly know what to do. The Rome Express! Doesn’t it sound wonderful?”
    She had, thought Elinor, grown even prettier during the months since they had last met. Her golden-brown hair, on which sat a small green hat, framed a face that was really almost perfect. The hazel eyes were fringed with long dark lashes, the nose small and straight, the mouth, generously covered with scarlet lipstick, full and soft. It was Rose’s mouth that had sometimes given Elinor her worst feelings of uneasiness, for it showed all the passion and sensitiveness of her nature. Rose, she was certain, was not the kind of girl to be pitchforked out into the world with so few preparations, so little sensible training. She was innocent, eager, determined to “live”, as she had said in her last letter.
    “I’ve done with that dreary nunnery and now I’m determined to enjoy myself. I’ve scarcely ever met a Man; do you realise that, Aunt Elinor? And I’ve never been anywhere. Italy will be a good start.”
    “But what after that?” Elinor asked herself, remembering the hastily scrawled words as she and David turned to face a small, fair man, wearing the Blue Dragon courier’s badge.
    “Mr. and Mrs. Gray? How do you do? I’m Stanley Burne, in charge of the party. I hope we’re all going to have a very pleasant holiday. This is the first party of the year, of course. We never start till the end of April. Have you just those two cases? Well, we’ve to wait for three more members of the party and then we can take our seats. That’s the train coming in now.”
    “What a dear little man!” said Rose softly, at Elinor’s side. “He hardly looks big enough to look after us all.”
    “I expect he’ll he very efficient,” said Elinor, laughing.  
    Rose’s eyes dwelt appreciatively on her aunt.
    “How very smart you look! I wish I had black hair and a pale complexion. I love that yellow suit and creamy coat!”
    “You look very nice yourself,” Elinor retorted, but her heart warmed. Rose might so very easily have thought thirty bordering on dull middle age.
    Rose drifted away then, and a couple standing near turned to the Grays and smiled.
    “I’m Griffith Parry-Hughes and this is my wife,” the man said, and while David made introductions and she murmured “How do you do?” Elinor thought that she would have known that he was Welsh without ever hearing his name and voice. For he had what she always thought of as a Welsh face, with the unmistakable bone structure of the Celt, the dark hair and eyes. But he was taller than she usually expected Welshmen to be, and exceedingly well-dressed. He was explaining that he was a solicitor from North Wales, but Elinor’s attention had already wandered. Her gaze roved over the remaining members of the party.
    Standing slightly apart was a pleasant, ordinary-looking couple and a girl of thirteen or fourteen. She was a striking looking child, with thick, smooth dark hair and considerable, rather coltish grace. Elinor heard her call the woman “Mother” and was mildly surprised that so ordinary a woman should have produced such a daughter, and yet perhaps there was a like­ness, for they shared the same clear skin and something in the expression. At any rate they all looked nice.
    Then there was another couple, both middle–aged and plump, who looked rather uneasy. The wife seemed to be fussing about something and the husband was glancing at his watch. Her voice came to Elinor clearly during a sudden lull in the station noises:
    “—silly to keep us standing here when the train’s in. When we went to Switzerland with Brand’s Tours there was nothing like this—”
    So they had been abroad before. Somehow she would have thought them more at home in an English seaside resort. But all kinds of people travelled nowadays.
    Finally there was a tall, rather heavily built young man, with a face that Elinor liked on sight. If the Parry–Hughes couple carried traces of their Welsh nationality this young man equally certainly suggested a certain type of Scot—reddish-­haired, big–boned, good–tempered. Thinking of Rose, Elinor felt with relief that he would make a steady and reliable companion for her, and then chided herself for jumping to too hasty conclusions. But her artist’s habit of studying faces usually made it possible for her to size people up quickly and accurately.
    It was twenty-five to eleven and people were starting to stream past the barrier. A party of nuns, with their small, shabby cases labelled ‘Rome’ . . . a voluble crowd of French­men . . . and all the usual English travellers, including dowdy women in tweed suits and sensible hats.
    Standing there, with the station sights and smells all about her, Elinor was caught up in the thrill of travel, as she had been from her earliest years. It was a thrill that she had almost forgotten since her marriage, but now here it was again, as vivid and alive as ever.
    Then she was suddenly conscious that David had stiffened and that all was not well with him. She glanced round quickly and saw that his face had gone pale and tense.
    “What is it?” she murmured, then saw that his eyes were fixed on an approaching woman, who was following a porter bearing three beautiful cream suitcases with Blue Dragon labels. She was an elderly woman, perhaps in her middle sixties, but she was charmingly if perhaps slightly over-dressed in light blue, with a little flowery hat on her softly curling white hair.
    The courier, Stanley Burne, had gone forward and was greeting her as Mrs. Monk-Moreton.
    “David!” Elinor said more urgently, since he was still staring. “Why do you look like that?”
    David Gray came to himself with an effort. He glanced at his wife and smiled.
    “It’s nothing. At least, I used to know her—at a time that I still don’t care to remember.”
    Elinor felt a sudden, sharp chill at her heart.