, don't you--that I'll be all right? People might think I hadn't
the right to love you till I was sure. But, then, I am sure--dead
sure."

"I'm sure, too." Her voice sounded brooding, a little husky. She took
his hand and laid it on her lap, spreading out the fingers as though to
examine each one in turn. "It's a clever, beautiful hand, Robert--much
the most beautiful part of you. It will do clever, wonderful things.
What will _you_ do?"

(As though, he thought, his hands were something apart and she was
inquiring deeper into what was vitally him.)

He told her. It reassured him to go back to his foundations and to
find them still standing. He lost his tongue-tied clumsiness and spoke
rapidly, clearly, with brief, strong gestures. His haggard youth gave
place to a forcible, aggressive maturity. He was like an architect who
had planned for every inch and stone of his masterpiece. Next year he
would pass his finals. He would take posts as locum tenens whenever he
could and keep his hospital connexions warm. In five years he would
save enough to specialize--the throat gave wide opportunities for
research. There were men already interested in him who would send him
work. In ten years Harley Street--if not before.

In the midst of it all he faltered and broke off to ask:

"Why do you love me, Francey?"

And then, impulsively, she flung her arm about him and drew him close
to her. His head was on her breast, and for one uncertain moment she
was not Francey Wilmot at all, but the warm living spirit of the
sunlight, of the quiet trees and the grass in which they lay--of all
the things of which he was afraid.

"Because you're such an odd, sad, little boy----"

3

After tea it began to rain, not dismally, but in a gentle way as people
cry who have been too happy.

"In this jolly old country fine weather means bad weather," Connie
Edwards commented cynically. She had reason to be depressed. The
impossible poppies dripped tears of blood over the brim of the
cartwheel hat. But apart from that misfortune she had never got over
her original mood of puzzled dissatisfaction, and she and Cosgrave
walked droopingly down the narrow lane arm in arm and almost wordless.

So much of winter days was left that it was dark when they reached the
foot of the hill--the eerie luminous darkness of the country when there
is a moon riding somewhere behind the clouds. Robert could see
Christine and Francey just ahea