Michael Levey recreates a between-the-wars English childhood outwardly ordinary and undramatic, but inwardly rich, stirring, sometimes bewildering, and altogether far from typical, not least in its pervasive Catholic ethos. An only child, he attended a succession of Catholic schools before joining the Army at the end of the War. His account of service life, spent partly in Egypt, is entertaining, as is the final chapter which finds him arriving apprehensively at the National Gallery in London.