RULE BRITANNIA

A salvo to the England that there'll always be, even if it doesn't amount to much more than that lovable stubbornness called "bloodymindedness," in the form of a benign now-based fantasy about the partnership of the United States and the United Kingdom into something called USUK. This is viewed — with considerable distrust — from a small promontory in Cornwall and from the household of an imposing-imperious old lady known as Mad or Madam. She had formerly been a leading actress; now she has adopted six parentless, disturbed boys including a "darkie." American marines land down here and there is a shooting of a dog, followed by one of the youngster's shooting of a marine, followed by something called Operation Dung-Cart, a form of resistance, followed by reprisals and a dark night of isolation seemingly under gunfire. Miss Du Maurier obviously likes her Mad-Madam and all that she imperturbably, intransigently represents; she also can do as she pleases with the assurance that others will go along with her although this is not the kind of story in which she once was sovereign. It's just quietly comfortable.