2. Alec protests when I suggest working on his model car, but he gives in eventually. I cut the pieces out and hand them to him, and file off burrs as requested, but mostly I'm watching and drinking peppermint tea. He is very pleased when it is completed. We decide to leave the battery -- a cunning mechanism involving salt water and magnesium -- until Nick and Bettany come home.
3. There is, at last, some time to look over my new book of Hiroshige prints. There are sixty in all, ones I've never seen before, and I only get through half of them
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