s other
aspects. They talked, however, most often of impersonal subjects--books,
pictures, plays, or whatever the world that interested them was
doing--and she showed no desire to draw him back to his own affairs. She
was again staying late in town--to have a pretext, as he guessed, for
coming down on Sundays to the Fairfords'--and they often made the trip
together in her motor; but he had not yet spoken to her of having begun
his book. One May evening, however, as they sat alone in the verandah,
he suddenly told her that he was writing. As he spoke his heart beat
like a boy's; but once the words were out they gave him a feeling of
self-confidence, and he began to sketch his plan, and then to go into
its details. Clare listened devoutly, her eyes burning on him through
the dusk like the stars deepening above the garden; and when she got up
to go in he followed her with a new sense of reassurance.

The dinner that evening was unusually pleasant. Charles Bowen, just back
from his usual spring travels, had come straight down to his friends
from the steamer; and the fund of impressions he brought with him gave
Ralph a desire to be up and wandering. And why not--when the book was
done? He smiled across the table at Clare.

"Next summer you'll have to charter a yacht, and take us all off to
the Aegean. We can't have Charles condescending to us about the
out-of-the-way places he's been seeing."

Was it really he who was speaking, and his cousin who was sending
him back her dusky smile? Well--why not, again? The seasons renewed
themselves, and he too was putting out a new growth. "My book--my
book--my book," kept repeating itself under all his thoughts, as
Undine's name had once perpetually murmured there. That night as he went
up to bed he said to himself that he was actually ceasing to think about
his wife...

As he passed Laura's door she called him in, and put her arms about him.

"You look so well, dear!"

"But why shouldn't I?" he answered gaily, as if ridiculing the fancy
that he had ever looked otherwise. Paul was sleeping behind the next
door, and the sense of the boy's nearness gave him a warmer glow. His
little world was rounding itself out again, and once more he felt safe
and at peace in its circle.

His sister looked as if she had something more to say; but she merely
kissed him good night, and he went up whistling to his room. The next
morning he was to take a walk with Clare, and while he lounged about t