IIAT HOME The fog was thicker than ever over in St. Petersgate Square, but there its brown folds hid no violence. Rather it was cosy, hardly cold, gentle, almost protective. The little close was well hidden even on the brightest of days. Ten years before even the enemy had not found it and so, almost alone in the district, the quiet houses remained much as they had always been. By yet another oversight the railings round the tiny square in the centre had been spared by the scrap merchants and the magnolia, two or three graceful laburnums and a tulip tree had overgrown unmolested. It was one of the smallest squares of its kind in the city. There were seven houses on each of two opposite sides, a wall on the third which shut out the steep drop into Portminster Row and the shops, and, on the
