terwards--when you've gone to bed."

Because he was so tired himself the unutterable weariness in her voice
smote him on the heart unbearably. He had never heard it before. It
made him think of her, for the first time, not just as Christine, who
looked after him and loved him, but as someone apart whom, perhaps, he
did not know at all. Hadn't they asked him, "Who is Christine?" And
he hadn't answered. He hadn't known.

"Mr. Ricardo says you will need a lot of help to pick up with the other
boys. Poor little Robert! But he takes an interest in you, and you
are to go to his house in the afternoon to be coached, and in a few
weeks you will know as much as any of them."

He did not know what "coaching" meant, but all of a sudden he had
become afraid of Mr. Ricardo. He did not want to go to him. He knew
that Mr. Ricardo would not like him to play with other boys, even if he
got a chance. He would want him to be alone and different always.

"He doesn't believe in God," Robert asserted accusingly. "He said he
didn't."

"Perhaps not, dear."

"Doesn't that matter?"

"I don't suppose God minds--if He exists."

"Don't you believe in Him, Christine?"

"I don't know. People say they believe too easily. I expect I believe
as much as the others. With most of us it's just--just a hope."

They had never talked together in that way before. It made her more
than ever someone apart from him, who had her own thoughts, and perhaps
her own secret way of being unhappy. He was frightened again, not of
the darkness now, but of something nearer--something so real and deadly
that the old spectres became almost comic, like ghosts made up of
dust-sheets and broom-handles. Supposing Christine went still further
from him--supposing she left him altogether alone? She wouldn't do it
of her free will, but there were things people couldn't help. People
died. The thought was a cruel hand twining itself into the strings of
his heart. He tried to see her face. Was she young? He didn't know.
He had never thought about it. She had been grown-up. That covered
everything. Now in the pale, unreal light her face and hair were a
strange dead gray, and she was old--old.

"Christine, how--how long do people live?"

"It depends. Sometimes to a hundred--sometimes just a minute.

"But if one is careful, Christine--I mean, really careful?"

"It doesn't always help, Robert. And even if it did, the people who
need to live most h