As she turns in at the gate she sees a fourth gentleman come down from the hillside and join them in the lane. He wears a Norfolk jacket, has a gun under his arm and two or three dogs at his heels. Mona recognizes the fourth gentleman as their landlord, and as she drives slowly past she hears her father say to him:
“But what about the farm, sir, when the war is over?”
“Don’t trouble about that,” says the landlord. “You are here for life, Robert—you and your children.”
Mona puts up her horse and goes into the house, and when the gentlemen have gone her father comes in to her. With a halting embarrassment he tells her what has happened. One of the gentlemen had been the Governor of the island, the strangers had been officials from the Home Office.
“It seems the Government in London have come to your opinion, girl.”
“What’s that?” says Mona.
“That the civilian Germans must be interned.”
“Interned? What does that mean?”
“Shut up in camps to keep them out of mischief.”