at that, and
failed and added--"the least bit. Do please tell me if I am."

"Not at all," said Mr. Brumley. "I hate my afternoon's walk as a
prisoner hates the treadmill."

"She's such a nice old creature."

"She's been a mother--and several aunts--to us ever since my wife died.
She was the first servant we ever had."

"All this house," he explained to his visitor's questioning eyes, "was
my wife's creation. It was a little featureless agent's house on the
edge of these pine-woods. She saw something in the shape of the
rooms--and that central hall. We've enlarged it of course. Twice. This
was two rooms, that is why there is a step down in the centre."

"That window and window-seat----"

"That was her addition," said Mr. Brumley. "All this room
is--replete--with her personality." He hesitated, and explained further.
"When we prepared this house--we expected to be better off--than we
subsequently became--and she could let herself go. Much is from Holland
and Italy."

"And that beautiful old writing-desk with the little single rose in a
glass!"

"She put it there. She even in a sense put the flower there. It is
renewed of course. By Mrs. Rabbit. She trained Mrs. Rabbit."

He sighed slightly, apparently at some thought of Mrs. Rabbit.

"You--you write----" the lady stopped, and then diverted a question that
she perhaps considered too blunt, "there?"

"Largely. I am--a sort of author. Perhaps you know my books. Not very
important books--but people sometimes read them."

The rose-pink of the lady's cheek deepened by a shade. Within her pretty
head, her mind rushed to and fro saying "Brumley? Brumley?" Then she had
a saving gleam. "Are you _George_ Brumley?" she asked,--"_the_ George
Brumley?"

"My name _is_ George Brumley," he said, with a proud modesty. "Perhaps
you know my little Euphemia books? They are still the most read."

The lady made a faint, dishonest assent-like noise; and her rose-pink
deepened another shade. But her interlocutor was not watching her very
closely just then.

"Euphemia was my wife," he said, "at least, my wife gave her to me--a
kind of exhalation. _This_"--his voice fell with a genuine respect for
literary associations--"was Euphemia's home."

"I still," he continued, "go on. I go on writing about Euphemia. I have
to. In this house. With my tradition.... But it is becoming
painful--painful. Curiously more painful now than at the beginning. And
I want to go. I want at last to m