Perhaps, after all, it wouldn't be kind to tell Maurice about the tennis
party. He couldn't have played like that. He couldn't have scrambled up
the water-butt and run with you along the scullery roof.

"My dearest Maurice: Nothing has happened since you left, except that
there was a tennis party at the Vicarage yesterday. You know what tennis
parties are like. You'll be shocked to hear that I wore my old black
jersey--the one you hated so--"


IX.

"'Mein Kind, wir waren Kinder.'"

She shut her eyes. She wanted nothing but his voice. His voice was alive.
It remembered. It hadn't grown old and tired. "My child, we once were
children, two children happy and small; we crept in the little hen-house
and hid ourselves under the straw."

"Kikerikueh! sie glaubten
Es waere Hahnen geschrei."

"...It's all very well, Mary, I can't go on reading Heine to you for
ever. And--_apres_?"

He had taken her on his knees. That happened sometimes. She kept one foot
on the floor so as not to press on him with her whole weight. And she
played with his watch chain. She liked to touch the things he wore. It
made her feel that she cared for him; it staved off the creeping,