Muriel Spark has won nearly every literary award possible and has been published by Penguin for over forty years. Her unique blend of realism, compelling storytelling and black humour continues to enchant and intrigue fans worldwide. Taken from The Complete Short Stories, these four tales are classic Spark: powerful and playful depictions of a world where commonplace situations are transformed by comic or sinister events.

Anne was already regretting her impulse in asking the couple to tea. They said very little but just sat on. She was afraid they would miss the last bus to the station. Looking at me, she said, 'The last bus goes at six, doesn't it?'

I said to Marion, 'You don't want to miss the last bus.'

'Could we see round the château?' said Marion. 'The guidebook says it's fourteenth century.'

'Well, not all of it is,' said Anne. 'But today is a bit difficult. We don't, you know, open the house to the public. We live in it.'

'I'm sure we've met,' said Marion to Anne, as if this took care of their catching the last bus - a point which was not lost on Anne. Kindly though she was I knew she hated to have to ferry people by car to the station and take on other chores she was not prepared for. I could see, already in Anne's mind, the thought: 'I have to get rid of these people or they'll stay for dinner and then all night. They are château-grabbers.'

Anne had often lamented to me about the château-grabbers of her later life. People who didn't want to know her when she was obscure and a bus driver's wife now wanted to know her intimately. Monty didn't care much about this, one way or another. But then the work of organizing meals and entertaining in style fell more on Anne than on Monty, who mostly spent his time helping the factor in the grounds, game-keeping and forest-clearing.

Anne could see that the English couple she had invited in 'for a cup of tea' were clingers, climbers, general nuisances, and she especially cast a look of desperation at me when Marion Ringer-Smith said, 'I'm sure we've met.'

'You think so?' Anne said. She had got up and was leading the way to the back door. 'This is the Cour des Adieus,' she said; 'it leads quicker to your bus stop.' Marion stooped and took a cake as if it was her last chance of ever eating a cake again.

I was at this moment coming to the end of a novel I was writing. Anne had offered me the peace and quiet of French château life and the informality of her own life-style which made it an ideal arrangement. She had also undertaken to type out the novel from any handwritten manuscripts on to a word-processor. But now at a quarter to six, I could see the rest of our afternoon's plans slipping away.

I doubted that Marion had indeed seen Anne before. It was by some mental process of transference that she had picked on Anne. The one she had actually met was myself, but she wasn't very much aware of it. After a gap of forty years, she remembered very little of me.

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