Hilary hardy saw Caroline in Water Langley during the summer vacation, as Caroline was with her family in the Dordogne, then she and Justinian went, with the London University Conservatives, to America, and, after that, Caroline, Justinian and the other two housemates were moving house.  Hilary and Andy were working together at the Langley Angel again, singing in the church choir and going for long walks by the Lang Brook.  The summer of 1975 was glorious, warm without being too hot, the combine harvesters humming in the background for almost a month, up and down the fields, even at night, their headlights forming two moving circles of light.  Margaret had decided that she and Frank should make a Will.  She mentioned it in the choir vestry after Sunday Eucharist, which was how she carried out most items of business: plumbing - to Fred Arnold, retired many years ago, but his son was a plumber; electrics - to Mrs Armitage, whose son-in-law was an electrician; health problems - to Kathy Metcalfe, receptionist at the doctors’ surgery, who would ask Dr Willetts for an appropriate prescription.  In this case, Margaret spoke to John Newton, solicitor. 

“Of course,” said John.  “Could you drop into the office in Langton some time?”  He turned to Robert, who was hanging up his cassock and surplice, with careful intensity.  “Robert, you could deal with this, couldn't you?”

Robert, who had finished Solicitors’ Finals some months ago and was now working as an articled clerk in his father’s firm, nodded.  The surplice had to be on top of the cassock (so that it didn’t crease) and shoulder seams of the surplice over the wire frame of the hanger. 

Hilary shivered as she and Margaret walked out the warm, sunlit, vestry into the cool stone church.  She didn’t like to think of her parents making Wills.  Margaret went to Newton & Ellis in Langton one afternoon the following week, and, several hours later, burst through the back door, arms full of shopping in carrier bags, crying, “Put the kettle on, please, Hil, before I go balmy!”

“Have you done it?” Hilary asked.

“No.  I haven't!”

“Why not?”

Blowing out her breath, she sank into the kitchen chair.  “I know he’s got to give work to Robert and I know Robert has to learn.  But I wish John had done it himself.

Hilary's grandmother followed Margaret through the back door, carrying more shopping bags.  Margaret would have picked her up in the car on her way back into the village, as she often did.  “Robert’s very clever,” said Mrs Rayner, putting lettuce and tomatoes into the fridge.

“Maybe,” said Margaret “but, today, he didn’t have a clue.  I know he’s shy.  Robert’s always been shy.  He didn’t have a pen and disappeared for ten minutes looking for one.  Then I was telling him about the Will, how Frank and I would be making a bequest to Hilary then leaving the residue to each other… but I could see he wasn’t listening.  He was looking out the window.  And, when I finished speaking, he was talking about parking in Langton High Street, and how the Council were going to put in double yellow lines.  So I went through it all again.  Then the telephone went on his desk, but he didn’t answer it.  It just went on ringing and ringing.  I was itching to answer it myself.”

“Robert never answers the phone,” said Hilary, pouring out the tea.

“You’re telling me!” Margaret sighed.  “After several minutes, the secretary came in and answered it for him.  Then Robert just got up from his chair and went out the room.”

“Strike!” cried Mrs Rayner.  “Didn’t you go and get somebody?”

“Well, I waited for a bit. After a few minutes, I got up and looked down the corridor, but Robert wasn’t anywhere around.  I asked the receptionist but she didn’t know where he was, thought he was with me.”

“Couldn’t you have asked to speak to John?” Mrs Rayner suggested.

“He was in court.  So, I went to Sainsbury’s.”

“You didn’t make your Will?” said Hilary.

“No.”

“What will you do?”

Margaret shrugged, as she got up to unpack the rest of the shopping.  “It’ll have to wait.  Don’t say anything about this to Andy, Hil.”

“I suppose,” said Mrs Rayner, “that Connie tells you that Robert is doing marvellously at Newton & Ellis.”

Margaret rolled her eyes.  “Connie wouldn’t tell me any differently, would she?  Anymore than Julia would tell me that she doesn’t care for that boyfriend of Caroline’s.”

“Justinian’s ghastly!” said Hilary.

“Well,” said Margaret, “Elizabeth Bennett didn’t care for the choice of husband made by her friend, Charlotte Lucas, did she?”

“Mr Collins?  He was awful!”

In October, Hilary returned to Rushloe, in her third year now, and still at Crofton Hall, a “corridor rep” again, although she was more sympathetic with tearful Freshers this year.  “Homesick?  I know.  You will feel better after a while.  Honestly…  Don’t like your room-mate?  No, I didn’t like mine…   Boyfriend at home?  My boyfriend’s in London.  We see each other every few weeks, but it does mean we get some work done.  Shall we see if we get your washing out the machine now?”

Hilary visited Andy in London in late October, staying with Caroline as usual.  Caroline’s new house was closer to St Luke's than the previous one, so, after spending Friday evening together, Hilary and Andy walked there.  Caroline’s housemate, Josie, answered the door.  “Hi, Hilary!  Hi Andy!” cried Josie, with Sloane Ranger enthusiasm. 

“I've got to go,” said Andy, who found her posh-ness irritating.

“Caz and Justinian are out, I'm afraid,” Josie said, shutting the door behind Hilary.  “Can I make you a coffee?”

Hilary winced at the abbreviation of Caroline’s name.  She looked around her, at the blue-tack marked, off-white marked walls, at the scuffed skirting boards and the grey carpets, and smelled the stale, musty smell which pervaded every student flat.  She was so glad to be in Crofton Hall!

“You can put your stuff in Caz’s room.”

Hilary, wincing again, allowed herself to be led upstairs.  “We let Caz have the biggest room for obvious reasons,” said Josie, pushing open a shabby, scratched door, into a room half the size of Hilary's at Crofton Hall. 

Hilary set her bag down on Caroline's bed and looked around her.  Suddenly, she felt uncomfortable.  “Could I have some tea, please?”

When Caroline and Justinian did return, Justinian was talking about standing for one of the sabbatical posts at the LSE Students Union, as an “independent”.  “Why don’t you just say you’re a Tory?” demanded Hilary, but they answered with pitying glances.

The following morning, Caroline was composing a letter to the Leader of the Opposition, Margaret Thatcher, asking her to address a LSE Conservative Group meeting next term.  “Do you think she’ll come?”

“It’d look good for Justinian on the hustings.”

“Hustings?”

“For the sabbatical post.”

“But you’re writing the letter, not him!”

Hilary didn’t want to talk to Caroline.  She left the house as soon as she could and walked back in the direction of Andy and St Luke's, her platform shoes thudding along Bloomsbury streets.  She arrived at 10.45, before St Luke's Hall was open to visitors, but the porter knew Hilary and let her in anyway.  St Luke's was as old fashioned as Crofton Hall, visitors allowed between 11am and midnight only, no girlfriends allowed to sleep over, and severe penalties exacted on any student who flouted the rules.  As she clambered up the wooden stairs, she recalled how Caroline had compared Crofton Hall to Water Langley.  St Luke's was Water Langley too.

Andy was lying spread-eagled over his bed, a file and a textbook open on his pillow.  She closed both as she pushed back his long, straggly hair to kiss him.  “You’re early!” he said, and she wondered, in passing, if he would rather work than see her. 

“Come on.  Let’s go out,” she said.

“How’s Caroline?” asked Andy, as he locked his door.  “Still with that prat with the stupid name?”

“When I arrived last night… Andy, his things were all over her room.”

“They are housemates, Hil.”

“And there were condom-wrappers in the waste paper basket.”

“It happens, Hil.  Even at St Luke's.  They may chuck the girls out at midnight, but it is possible to have it off before midnight.”

Hilary shivered.  “He’s repulsive.”

“Justinian?  Agreed!”

“And she said to me, in Rushloe, last term, that she didn’t love him and she didn’t want to.”

“She changed her mind, then.  Caroline wouldn’t do anything Caroline didn’t want to do, Hil.”

“Wouldn’t she?  He was putting pressure on her.”

He put his arm around her shoulders as they walked out into the street.  “It’s only sex.  Couples do have sex.  It’s not like in our parents’ day.”

“We’ve never gone the whole way.”

“Not quite.”

They walked around until the pubs opened, around Russell Square Gardens, and the British Museum, then they bought drinks and lunch at one of their usual pubs in Southampton Row. 

“One day,” said Andy, speaking against the juke box and the general babble of pub chatter, “we’ll want to do it.  Well, I know I will.”

Hilary looked down at her feet, at her new platform shoes with cork soles, on the scruffy, litter-strewn, pub floor.  For a moment, she hadn't understood what he meant.  “No one has sex in Water Langley,” she quipped.

As Hilary and Andy were leaving the pub, Hilary spotted Justinian and Josie sitting together, their heads so close as to be almost touching. “Oh, hello!” cried Josie, jumping up.  “We… were just researching our essay.  We… both do politics, you know.”

“Liberation Theology in the Third World,” said Justinian.