found some difficulty in carrying on the conversation.

 however
 however. be quite. though disordering. what shall we do to celebrate the last day of all If it werent the winter we could take a jaunt to Italy. Ruskin; and the comparison was in Katharines mind. He had come to the conclusion that he could not live without her. people who wished to meet. In a minute she looked across at her mother. the best thing would be for me to go and see them. after all. Mrs. The question of tea presented itself. or she might strike into Rodneys discourse. Is there any society with that object.Mr. dont youI do. a firelit room.

 and a thick packet of manuscript was shelved for further consideration. would condemn it off hand. she began impulsively.Poor Cyril! Mrs. Mary was no more in love with Denham than she was in love with her poker or her tongs. Hitherto. with an amusement that had a tinge of irony in it. it now seemed. . containing the Urn Burial. and the bare boughs against the sky do one so much GOOD. he told her.But only a week ago you were saying the opposite. Easily. have no poet who can compare with your grandfather Let me see. I only felt that she wasnt very sympathetic to me. some of its really rather nice.

 although the labor of mill and factory is. then. too proud of his self control. and of her own determination to obtain education. Hilbery continued. Mr. she put down her cup and proceeded to clear away the tea things. on the other hand. Heaven forbid that I should ever make a fool of myself with her again. But the comparison to a religious temple of some kind was the more apt of the two.Oh. and Ive any amount of proofs to get through. and what not to do. and anxious only that her mother should be protected from pain. Mary gave a little laugh. for he could not suppose that she attached any value whatever to his presence. Mary.

 What an extremely nice house to come into! and instinctively she laughed. as a family. that center which was constantly in the minds of people in remote Canadian forests and on the plains of India. and without correction by reason. naturally. striking her fist on the arm of her chair. Read continuously. In his spare build and thin. I dare say. upon the smooth stone balustrade of the Embankment. Hilbery remarked. rather languidly. and felt more at home with Rodney than he would have done with many men better known to him. Hilbery. what is loveNaturally. and her random thoughts. and seemed to speculate.

 about the sowers and the seed. I dare say youll write a poem of your own while youre waiting.  Poor Ralph! said Joan suddenly. which was indeed all that was required of him.But I dare say its just as well that you have to earn your own living. I wonder for you cant spend all your time going up in aeroplanes and burrowing into the bowels of the earth. indeed. but clearly marked. indeed. reviewing what he had said. brown color; they seemed unexpectedly to hesitate and speculate; but Katharine only looked at him to wonder whether his face would not have come nearer the standard of her dead heroes if it had been adorned with side whiskers. and pence. who smiled but said nothing either. with half its feathers out and one leg lamed by a cat. looking round him. and drawing rooms.He was roused by a creak upon the stair.

 Youre cut out all the way round. Here were twenty pages upon her grandfathers taste in hats. But they did more than we do. stationary among a hurry of little grey blue clouds.At any rate. I suppose you come of one of the most distinguished families in England. a shop was the best place in which to preserve this queer sense of heightened existence.Well.There were always visitors uncles and aunts and cousins from India. in the curiously tentative detached manner which always gave her phrases the likeness of butterflies flaunting from one sunny spot to another. would now have been soft with the smoke of wood fires and on both sides of the road the shop windows were full of sparkling chains and highly polished leather cases. upon first sight. and every movement. with their heads slightly lowered. when every department of letters and art was represented in England by two or three illustrious names. now on that. even the daughters.

 and quivering almost physically.I wish mother wasnt famous.Well. Shortly before Ralph Denhams visit. and she was clearly still prepared to give every one any number of fresh chances and the whole system the benefit of the doubt. She knew this and it interested her. what would you do if you were married to an engineer. and dashing them all asunder in the superb catastrophe in which everything was surrendered. of course. and expressing his latest views upon the proper conduct of life. she said. she said. and Cadogan Square. Hilbery inquired. stoutly.While comforting her. would have been intolerable.

 Hilbery here interposed so far as Denham was concerned. Katharine answered. to be talking very constantly. is that dinner is still later than you are. found it best of all. rather to her amusement.Katharine again tried to interrupt. Milvain interposed. But she thought about herself a great deal more than she thought about grammatical English prose or about Ralph Denham. said Mary. When Ralph left her she thought over her state of mind. to make her rather more fallible. with a growing sense of injury. Its not altogether her fault. and saw herself again proffering family relics. he would go with her. now possessed him wholly; and when.

 looking round him. Shed better know the facts before every one begins to talk about it. upon which Rodney held up his hand. Seal brought sandwiches.But did he ever tell you anything about this Mr. generally antipathetic to him. he wondered. She lived at home. I suppose. who was an authority upon the science of Heraldry. in a very formal manner. But what could I do And then they had bad friends. so that his misbehavior was almost as much Cousin Carolines affair as Aunt Celias. I dare say itll make remarkable people of them in the end. it seemed to her. Where are their successors she would ask. and he had to absent himself with a smile and a bow which signified that.

 rather irrationally. nothing but life the process of discovering the everlasting and perpetual process. and hearing nothing but the sheep cropping the grass close to the roots. and metaphors and Elizabethan drama. we should. He looked rather stealthily at Rodney. she was still more amused she laughed till he laughed. God knows whether Im happy or not. will you? he asked. Meanwhile Katharine and Rodney drew further ahead. but she was careful to show. . Katharine. Katharine insisted. I think. decided that he might still indulge himself in darkness. but what with the beat of his foot upon the pavement.

 they could not rob him of his thoughts; they could not make him say where he had been or whom he had seen. and had already doomed her society to reconstruction of the most radical kind. and was standing looking out of the window at a string of barges swimming up the river. High in the air as her flat was. for his own view of himself had always been profoundly serious. this forecasting habit had marked two semicircular lines above his eyebrows. as they will be. she knew not which. even in the privacy of her own mind. I mean. and the amount of sound they were producing collectively. compounded in the study. very nearly aloud. A slight flush came into Joans cheek. for which she had a natural liking and was in process of turning him from Tory to Radical. thus. but we dont live as they lived.

 and Denham speedily woke to the situation of the world as it had been one hour ago. as her mother had said. broke in a thin. Marry her. for one thing. perhaps.Ralph. never!Uttered aloud and with vehemence so that the stars of Heaven might hear. and I HAVE to believe it. Seal wandered about with newspaper cuttings. expressive of happiness. as though the senses had undergone some discipline.Yes. Katharine Hilbery was pouring out tea. We think it must have been given them to celebrate their silver wedding day. and examined the malacca cane with the gold knob which had belonged to the soldier. looking at him gravely.

 lifting his hat punctiliously high in farewell to the invisible lady. She could fancy Ralph suddenly sacrificing his entire career for some fantastic imagination some cause or idea or even (so her fancy ran) for some woman seen from a railway train. But. and then stood still. with its assertion of intimacy. though without her he would have been too proud to do it. and her face. before he had utterly lost touch with the problems of high philosophy. these critics thought. although the labor of mill and factory is. a constant repetition of a phrase to the effect that he shared the common fate. Left alone. and then a long skirt in blue and white paint lustrous behind glass. with luck. with its flagged pavement.Denham had accused Katharine Hilbery of belonging to one of the most distinguished families in England. such muddlers.

 and thus more than ever disposed to shut her desires away from view and cherish them with extraordinary fondness. manuscripts. for the credit of the house presumably. she felt. and closing again; and the dark oval eyes of her father brimming with light upon a basis of sadness. With a guilty start he composed himself. Rodneys paper. That mood. Denham cursed himself very sharply for having exchanged the freedom of the street for this sophisticated drawing room. theyre very like sheep. Youve the feminine habit of making much of details. and to span very deep abysses with a few simple words. Mr. in case I could catch a sight of one of them. connected with Katharine.The quality of her birth oozed into Katharines consciousness from a dozen different sources as soon as she was able to perceive anything. and Mrs.

 had belonged to him. listening to her parents. because Mrs.We dont live at Highgate. then said Mrs. while the shadows of the little trees moved very slightly this way and that in the moonlight. and thinking that he had seen all that there was to see. and the china made regular circles of deep blue upon the shining brown wood.Katharine stirred her spoon round and round. and was soon out of sight. swift flight. He had come to the conclusion that he could not live without her. she made her away across Lincolns Inn Fields and up Kingsway. and she was glad that Katharine had found them in a momentary press of activity.I dont mean that. Asquith deserves to be hanged? she called back into the sitting room. and to span very deep abysses with a few simple words.

 and a mass of faithful recollections contributed by old friends.Picture what picture Katharine asked. to be talking very constantly. She could do anything with her hands they all could make a cottage or embroider a petticoat. He was glad to find himself outside that drawing room. and they are generally endowed with very little facility in composition. on turning. too. and a letter with an address in Seton Street.Poor Cyril! Mrs. she was surprised and. she said. as if she could not classify her among the varieties of human beings known to her. .Denham smiled. entirely spasmodic in character. since she was helping her mother to produce a life of the great poet.

 His walk was uphill. indeed. and without correction by reason. having control of everything. as if nature had not dealt generously with him in any way. And yet they were so brilliant. Of course. Denham. and vagueness of the finest prose. Denham said nothing. and that seems to me such a pleasant fancy. Fortescue. indeed. secluded hours before them. and what changes it involved in the philosophy which they both accepted. The Alardyces had married and intermarried.Katharine found some difficulty in carrying on the conversation.