and a door on the ground floor and basement. At the back was
a small garden, with flower beds surrounding a square of gravel, and
a tricycle house in one corner. There was a back door in this garden,
which gave on to a street of cottages. This back door was a point of
strategic importance.

But I need not describe the house in detail. It was exactly like
thousands of other houses built in the beginning of the nineteenth
century. High, respectable, ugly and rather inconvenient, with many
stairs, two or three big rooms, a lot of small ones and no bathroom.
It was essentially a family house, intended for people of moderate
means and large families. Nowadays they build houses which are
prettier, and have bathrooms; but they are not meant for large
families.

We were a large family, and a fairly noisy one. Moreover, we were
singularly self-sufficing. We hadn't many friends, we didn't entertain
much, we had dinner in the middle of the day, and supper in the
evening.

There was my father who was a recluse, my mother who was essentially
our mother, the two girls and four boys. I was an afterthought, being
seven years younger than my next brother, who for seven years had
been called B. (for baby), and couldn't escape from it even after my
appearance.

In addition to these, B. and I both had inseparable friends, who lived
within a stone's throw. Ronnie was my _alter ego_ till I was fourteen:
so much so that I had no other friend. Even now, though our ways
have kept us apart, and our interests and opinions are fundamentally
different, we can sit in each other's rooms with perfect content. We
know too much of each other for it to be possible to pretend to be
what we are not. We sit and are ourselves, naked and unashamed so to
speak, and it is very restful.

Pictures float before my mind. Let me select a few. I see a rather
fat, stolid little boy in a big airy nursery at the top of the house,
sitting in the middle of the floor playing with bricks. Outside it is
gusty and wet, and the small boy hopes that he will be allowed to stay
in all the afternoon, and play with bricks. But that is not to be. A
small thin man, with gentle grey eyes, short curly beard, an old black
greatcoat and a black square felt hat, comes in. The child must have
some air. The child is resentful, but resigned, is wrapped up well,
put in his pram and wheeled up and down the Madeira Road.

"Pa" didn't appear very much except on some such errand; but "Ma