The Hireling

The story opens at an expensive mental clinic in the country where the young and recently widowed Lady Franklin is being discharged. The owner of a smart hire car, former sergeant-major Ledbetter, chauffeurs her to her unsympathetic mother in Bath. When he takes her to a boxing night at a boys club she meets another committee member, the young former officer Cantrip. Cantrip starts wooing the wealthy Lady Franklin while still sleeping with his lover Connie, who is probably a war widow.