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'Romilly flushed; she did know what he meant. Thedrive seemed to go on for ever: hot, blindingly sunny, theold car lurching over the road. Any woman apartfrom Octavia, of course. The only movement in the still, darkblue air was made by her small friends.

''You can't. 'Notto warn them is to duck moral responsibility. Octavia sat with all three children in the kitchen, while Minty ate anenormous lunch of fishfingers and peas and sweetcorn inbetween submitting to the interminable embraces of her brother and sister. 'I'd forgotten,' Octavia said coolly.