und Nan's shoulders; she was kneeling among the proofs.

"My little girl--Nan!"

"Mother...."

They held each other close. It was a queer moment, though not an
unprecedented one in the stormy history of their relations together.
A queer, strange, comforting, healing moment, the fleeting shadow of a
great rock in a barren land; a strayed fragment of something which should
have been between them always but was not. Certainly an odd moment.

"My own baby.... You're unhappy...."

"Unhappy--yes.... Darling mother, it can't be helped. Nothing can be
helped.... Don't let's talk ... darling."

Strange words from Nan. Strange for Mrs. Hilary to feel her hand held
against Nan's wet cheek and kissed.

Strange moment: and it could not last. The crying child wants its mother;
the mother wants to comfort the crying child. A good bridge, but one
inadequate for the strain of daily traffic. The child, having dried
its tears, watches the bridge break again, and thinks it a pity but
inevitable. The mother, less philosophic, may cry in her turn, thinking
perhaps that the bridge may be built this time in that way; but, the
child having the colder heart, it seldom is.

There remain the moments, impotent but indestructible.

CHAPTER XIV

YOUTH TO YOUTH

1

Kay was home for the Christmas vacation. He was full, not so much of
Cambridge, as of schemes for establishing a co-operative press next year.
He was learning printing and binding, and wanted Gerda to learn too.

"Because, if you're really not going to marry Barry, and if Barry sticks
to not having you without, you'll be rather at a loose end, won't you,
and you may as well come and help us with the press.... But of course,
you know," Kay added absently, his thoughts still on the press, "I should
advise you to give up on that point."

"Give up, Kay? Marry, do you mean?"

"Yes.... It doesn't seem to me to be a point worth making a fuss about.
Of course I agree with you in theory--I always have. But I've come to
think lately that it's not a point of much importance. And perfectly
sensible people are doing it all the time. You know Jimmy Kenrick and
Susan Mallow have done it? They used to say they wouldn't, but they have.
The fact is, people _do_ do it, whatever they say about it beforehand.
And though in theory it's absurd, it seems often to work out pretty well
in actual life. Personally I should make no bones about it, if I wanted
a girl and she wanted marriage. O