he didn't want her.

"You'd rather I didn't go," she said gently.

"It isn't that, Anne. It isn't that I don't want you. It's--it's simply
that I want to get away from here, to get away from everything that
reminds me--I shall go off my head if I've got to remember every minute,
every time I see somebody who--I want to make a clean break and grow a
new memory."

"I understand. You needn't tell me."

"Mother doesn't. I wish you'd make her see it."

"I'll try. But it's all right, Jerrold. I won't go."

"Of course you'll go. Only you won't think me a brute if I don't take
you out with me?"

"I'm not going out with you. In fact, I don't think I'm going at all. I
only wanted to because of going out together and because of the chance
of seeing you when you got leave. I only thought of the heavenly times
we might have had."

"Don't--don't, Anne."

"No, I won't. After all, I shouldn't care a rap about Ambala if you
weren't there. And you may be stationed miles away. I'd rather go back
to Ilford and do farming. Ever so much rather. India would really have
wasted a lot of time."

"Oh, Anne, I've spoilt all your pleasure."

"No, you haven't. There isn't any pleasure to spoil--now."

"What a brute--what a cad you must think me."

"I don't, Jerry. It's not your fault. Things have just happened. And you
see, I understand. I felt the same about Auntie Adeline after Mother
died. I didn't want to see her because she reminded me--and yet, really,
I loved her all the time."

"You won't go back on me for it?"

"I wouldn't go back on you whatever you did. And you mustn't keep on
thinking I _want_ to go to India. I don't care a rap about India itself.
I hate Anglo-Indians and I simply loathe hot places. And Daddy doesn't
want me out there, really. I shall be much happier on my farm. And it'll
save a lot of expense, too. Just think what my outfit and passage would
have cost."

"You wouldn't have cared what it cost if--"

"There isn't any if. I'm not lying, really." Not lying. Not lying. She
would have given up more than India to save Jerrold that pang of memory.
Only, when it was all over and he had sailed without her, she realized
in one wounding flash that what she had given up was Jerrold himself.

V

ELIOT AND ANNE

i

Anne did not go back to her Ilford farm at once. Adeline had made that
impossible.

At the prospect of Anne's going her resentment died down as suddenly as
it had risen. She forgot that