Once the excitement of knowing where he was, the sense of out-of-placeness, had worn off, this tiny mud-flat island was a boring place.

The men were withdrawn and either silent or snarling, the women were jealous, surly and uncooperative, and the male guests were feeling their alienness and out-of-placeness.

He said, amused at her, at her rocking and her intensity, the amusement struggling up through the out-of-placeness of the room, the woman and the house, 'Yes, Auntie, what kind of job?