She May Not Leave. Fay Weldon

       Martyn And Hattie Have Employed An Au Pair

      ‘Agnieszka?’ asks Martyn. ‘Isn’t that far too long a name? If she wants to get on in this country she’ll have to shorten it. People are just not familiar with sshzk.’

      ‘But she won’t want to shorten it,’ says Hattie. ‘People have their pride, and a loyalty to the parents who named them.’ ‘If we pay her,’ says Martyn, ‘she may have to do more or less as we ask.’

      Martyn is in conversation with Hattie in their economical, comfortable first-time-buyers’ house in London’s Kentish Town. Both are in their early thirties, handsome, healthy and educated, and for reasons of principle not