Mrs. Noel Merton looked out of the dining-room window with considerable displeasure. It was mid-May and for at least the one hundred and thirty-fifth time that year the day was beginning with cold grey sulks accompanied by a highly unsympathetic wind. Every tree looked as if it had been blown inside out, the grass was as leaden as the sky, the river at the bottom of the garden looked like a cross between mud flats and dirty pewter. A few melancholy birds, their tails blown almost over their heads, their breast feathers untidily ruffled, were lounging aimlessly on the terrace. Not as it used to be, thought Mrs. Merton; a thought which was in the minds of all her elders and most of her contemporaries by day and by night. Since the glorious summer which marked the days of Dunkirk warmth and light had been withdrawn from England, and the peace, which certainly passed everyone’s understanding, had not had the faintest influence on the weather which had got the bit well between its teeth and was rapidly heading for the ice age.