[Alan Pryce-Jones] were invited to tea by Mrs Guy Cary who, as a Roche by birth, was delighted to entertain another Anglo-Irishwoman. The customary routine had been organised; the purring kettle, the cucumber sandwiches, the chocolate cake. Suddenly, Mrs Cary, then well past 80, announced that she had left her handkerchief upstairs and disappeared for a few minutes. Very shortly after, she found that in fetching her handkerchief she had left her glasses. Up the stairs she vanished onve more.

"After the third or fourth climb, I noticed that she had a little difficulty in negotiating the steps. I put this down to age. But, trained in Irish ways, Elizabeth was on to the facts in a flash and, when we left the house, turned to me in indignation.

"'I, too, like martinis,' she said, 'and all we were offered was tea..."