He gurgled out some expressions of gratitude and took his departure, while I renewed my attack upon the sardines and bread.

Fortified by this simple cheer, I devoted the remainder of the morning to tidying up my shed.  I felt that I was living in such uncertain times that it would be just as well to remove all possible traces of the work I had been engaged on, and by midday the place looked almost as tidy as when I had first entered it.

I then treated myself to a cigar and began to keep a look-out for Joyce.  She had not said in her letter what time she would arrive, but I knew that there were a couple of trains early in the afternoon, and I remembered that I had told her to come straight to the hut.

It must have been getting on for two when I suddenly caught sight of a motor car with a solitary occupant coming quickly along the Tilbury road.  It pulled up as it reached the straggling plantation opposite the hut, and a minute later a girl appeared from between the trees, and started to walk towards me across the marsh.

I was a little surprised, for I didn’t know that Joyce included motor driving amongst her other accomplishments, and she had certainly never mentioned to me that there was any chance of her coming down in a car.  Then, a moment later, the truth suddenly hit me with paralysing abruptness.  It was not Joyce at all; it was Sonia.

I don’t know why the discovery should have given me such a shock, for in a way I had been expecting her to turn up any time.  Still a shock it undoubtedly did give me, and for a second or so I stood there staring stupidly at her like a man who has suddenly lost the use of his limbs.  Then, pulling myself together, I turned away from the window and strode to the door.

She came up to me swiftly and eagerly, moving with that strange lissom grace that always reminded me of some untamed animal.  Her hurried walk across the marsh had brought a faint tinge of colour into the usual ivory clearness of her skin, and her dark eyes were alive with excitement.

I held out my hands to welcome her.  “I was beginning to think you’d forgotten the address, Sonia,” I said.

With that curious little deep laugh of hers she pulled my arms round her, and for several seconds we remained standing in this friendly if a trifle informal attitude.  Then, perceiving no reasonable alternative, I bent down and kissed her.

“Ah!” she whispered.  “At last!  At last!”

Deserted as the marsh was, it seemed rather public for this type of dialogue, so drawing her inside the hut I closed the door.

She looked round at everything with rapid, eager interest.  “I have heard all about the powder,” she said.  “It’s quite true, isn’t it?  You have done what you hoped to do?”

I nodded.  “I’ve blown up about twenty yards of Canvey Island with a few ounces of it,” I said.  “That seems good enough for a start.”