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longer believe that what I am doing is right, or even desirable. I'm afraid I can't stop Sterilin at this stage; the work is too advanced. Slade can pick up where I leave off."

He turned round to face her, his eyes solemn.

"I just want to wash my hands of the whole damned business."

E. J. eyed him shrewdly. In the cold, flat light from the window she looked older now, and there were fine lines around her mouth and under her eyes.

"All right," she said "Resign if you wish. After all, you can always withdraw your resignation within the next four weeks."

"I'm afraid you don't really understand me, E. J.," said Gorste.

E. J. nodded slowly. "I think I do. The real trouble, Mr. Gorste, is that you don't understand yourself."

Anne had to be told, of course. Now that he had assumed the pose of righteousness (and it was a pose, he realized, but an essential pose to provide a kind of spiritual stability, and fill some indefinable vacuum in his emotional make-up), he had to be consistent in himself and follow it through. It would hurt Anne considerably, and so little did he know her that he found himself unable to predict her reaction. Would she become cold and silent and malevolent, or would she be consumed in vindictive fury? Or, more happily, would she remain calm and talk about the situation reasonably and understandingly as he himself would try to do.

Surprisingly, when he arrived home, the television set had not been switched on. Anne was reading the evening paper without much interest, and the moment he came into the room she put it down and came over to him and kissed him.