She led the way to the table in the corner, beneath the window, lingered a little chatting, and then was called away. Nearly four o’clock. Jennifer might be late: she always was. The room was empty save for two women in the opposite corner, engrossed in the usual whispered tea-shop confidences. What warmth and colour Jennifer would bring with her when she came! Judith thought. “I won’t look towards the door; I’ll look out of the window; and then suddenly I’ll turn round and she’ll be there.” Where she sat, the purple curtain obscured her conveniently from the street; if she craned her neck forward a little she could just see round the curtain and out of the window. Over the large shop-front directly opposite, on the other side of the narrow street, the blue blind was drawn down; and the plated glass made a dark mirror. Within its space she watched a shadow-show of people passing to and fro. The clocks chimed the hour. The street was filling up now. It was amusing to keep one’s eyes fixed on the blue blind, to see only an insubstantial noiseless world of human forms, cars and motor-bicycles, and be blind to the confusion of human and mechanical reality collecting outside. She would look only at the blue blind and see Jennifer’s reflection approaching before she saw herself. Her heart beat at the thought. The room was filling up now. She tipped Jennifer’s chair against the table, for fear it should be taken; resumed her watching. The space of glass cleared suddenly, was empty of all its shapes. She stared into the dim blank, waiting. Then two shadows slid slowly in and paused. She watched them calmly, knew them without shock of alarm or surprise. Roddy bent his head to light his pipe. She knew the individual set of his feet, his long legs, the slender rather round-shouldered line of his back. She could almost discern his curious blunt profile, with its upward sweep of brow and eye. Tony was with him. His short figure had its hands in its pockets, its head raised towards Roddy, nodding slightly as if in earnest conversation. The noise in the street seemed to die away, and in the long hushed breathless space of a minute, Roddy lit his pipe, threw away the match, passed a hand over his hair in a familiar gesture, nodded and laughed, it seemed, looking down at Tony with that queer half-turn of the head; and then moved on, slipped with his companion towards the edge of the pane; and vanished. He had come to see Tony then, just as if nothing had happened: as if he had not searched the sea for dead Martin; as if there were no reason not to go smoking, laughing, talking past the great court of Trinity. Did he miss Martin? Had he put from him the memory of the tragedy with a characteristic shrug of the shoulders? Did he ever think with momentary discomfort of Judith?