wthorn buds, the pathetic immature barrenness of the walnuts.

And even the leafless walnuts were full of alien life, for in their
hollow boles chippering starlings made furtive nests, and in their
topmost forks jackdaws worked with clamorous zeal. A pale butterfly here
and there accomplished its early day, and queen wasps awakened from
their winter slumber in cosy crevices, the tiniest winter-palaces in the
world, sped like golden arrow tips to and from the homes they had to
build alone for the swarms that were to come. The flower beds shone gay
with tulips and hyacinths; in the long grass beyond the lawn and under
the trees danced a thousand daffodils; and by their side warmly wrapped
up in furs lay Doria on a long cane chair.

She could not literally dance with the daffodils as I had prophesied,
for her full strength had not yet returned, but there she was among
them, and she smiled at them sympathetically as though they were dancing
in her honour. She was, however, restored to health; the great circles
beneath her eyes had disappeared and a tinge of colour shewed beneath
her ivory cheek. Beside her, in the first sunbonnet of the year, sat
Susan, a prim monkey of nine. . . . Lord! It scarcely seemed two years
since Jaffery came from Albania and tossed the seven year old up in his
arms and was struck all of a heap by Doria at their first meeting. So
thought I, looking from my study-table at the pretty picture some thirty
yards, away. And once again--pleasant self repetition of
history--Jaffery was expected. Doria, fresh from Nice, had spent a night
at her father's house and had come down to us the evening before to
complete her convalescence. She had wanted to go straight to the flat in
St. John's Wood and begin her life anew with Adrian's beloved ghost, and
she had issued orders to servants to have everything in readiness for
her arrival, but Barbara had intervened and so had Mr. Jornicroft, a man
of limited sympathies and brutal common sense. All of us, including
Jaffery, who seemed to regard advice to Doria as a presumption only
equalled by that of a pilgrim on his road to Mecca giving hints to Allah
as to the way to run the universe, had urged her to give up the abode of
tragic memories and find a haven of quietude elsewhere. But she had
indignantly refused. The home of her wondrous married life was the home
of her widowhood. If she gave it up, how could she live in peace with
the consciousness ever in her brain t