Her assurance left him vaguely unsatisfied. She drew away from him with a sidelong glance, half sad, half ribald, as if she knew and was regretfully amused at what he was thinking. She leaned over the table, cake knife in hand.

"Have some of this iced cake, Osborn? Bought specially for you."

For a while that pleased and appeased him. He asked more casually for news, and she told him of Rokeby's and Julia's surprise wedding.

He sat back, astonished, exclaiming:

"Good heavens! How unsuitably people marry!"

"They do, don't they?"

The noise in the next room had subsided; and presently the handle of the sitting-room door turned quietly, and three inquiring faces looked in, Minna holding the baby steady.

Over Marie's face there came a change. From its half-cold inconsequence and restraint, it warmed and lighted, as her hands went out eagerly.

"Come along, chicks," she said; and then, turning to her husband, she added quickly: "If you don't mind? I always read to them before bedtime. Do you mind?"

"Why should I, darling?" he said, surprised.

The three children, encouraged, came forward. George had the chosen book under his arm and, opening it at a favourite story, he laid it on his mother's knee. Nursing the baby and with Minna snuggled into her other arm, she prepared to read.

"Come and sit on my knee, old chap," Osborn whispered to George.

The child came dutifully, but his attention was for his mother. She began to read in her light, clear voice, and for some while that was the only sound in the room; the man and the three children listened, as if entranced. During the progress of the reading Ann came in without interrupting and took the baby away to bed.

A quarter of an hour later it was Minna's turn, and only George remained; he was eager to tell his mother of the day's experiences at school; clambering down from his father's lap he went to her, and, with an arm flung about her neck, began an involved account.

She listened with interest and comprehension. And Osborn looked at George's rapt face and her loving one, and drew a sharp comparison between what mattered and trash.

At last George went, and the husband and wife were alone again.

He started to the door on a sudden impulse.

"I'll unpack and get those things," he said over his shoulder.

"Yes, do," she nodded, "before George goes to sleep. Your things are in the dressing-room, and he will be there."

"We've simply got to have another flat," he replied, with a pleasant sensation of the power to pay for it.

For a few minutes Marie Kerr sat quiet, staring at the fire. The home-coming, so stimulating to Osborn, had for her been inexpressibly stale. She was not thrilled; she was left cold as the November night outside. The new and pretty habits of her life were in peril of being broken, and her reluctance that it should be so was keen. She got up and mended the fire and patted the cushions absently. She could hear Osborn talking to his son, and Ann busy in the kitchen.

A man in the house was once more going to set the clock of life.

Before Osborn had found what he sought she went to her bedroom. The baby and Minna were sleeping side by side in their cots, a screen drawn round them to shade them from the light. Deep in the perfect slumber of childhood, they did not awake at her careful entry. She switched up the electric light over her dressing-table, and began to change her blouse and skirt for the black frock in which she dined.

While she was standing thus, half dressed, Osborn came in.

She swung round upon him, hands raised in the act of smoothing her hair, and there was something in her face which made him halt. He looked at her uncertainly.

She could not have helped saying if she would:

"You startled me. I didn't hear you knock."

He had not knocked. The puzzle in his head increased. Why should he knock? His mouth opened and shut again. He came forward hesitatingly.

"I--I--what do you mean, darling?" he began. "I wanted to bring you these."

His coming thus was to her symbolic of legal intrusion upon all her future privacy. In that year, privacy had been one of the things she enjoyed most, after the edge was off the first loneliness. She found it hard to relinquish her right to it. She stepped into the frock quickly, and drew it upwards before he reached her. His hands were full of little things, which he cast in a hurry upon the dressing-table. She knew that he wanted to touch, to fondle her. She slipped her arms swiftly into the sleeves and fastened the first hook across her breast; in her eyes a shrinking antagonism unveiled itself.

She uttered hurriedly: "We have to be very quiet; the children are asleep."

He cast a cursory glance towards the screened corner.

"They're all right; they can't see or hear or anything else. Come here and let me put this hair-band thing on."

She stood a dressing-table length away, fumbling with the hooks, her eyes fixed on him.

"I have lots of things to say to you," she began suddenly.

"Say them to-morrow," he replied in his old way.

"No," she said, "they have to be said to-night--not this minute, perhaps, but presently."

She was in Osborn's arms again, and he was touching her throat, her hair, and the velvet texture of her cheek.

"You've got fatter again," he was saying delightedly; "you look just like the little girl I married, only there's something bigger about you; firmer. There's no doubt marriage stiffens a woman up. That's it, isn't it? You're sure of yourself."

She gazed full into his eyes. "Yes. I'm sure of myself; absolutely sure."

"You always had ripping hair; but I think it's got thicker, hasn't it?

It's springy, sort of electric."

"It used to be thick; and then it was thin; and now it's thick again, I think."

"You do it differently."

"One changes with the styles."

"_You_ would, you up-to-date thing. Now, you're going to look at these souvenirs of Paris, aren't you?"

He held her close to his side, while he showed her what he had chosen; the pale-pink collars--"You were always gone on pink, weren't you?" he asked--the silk stockings and the vanity garters. With clumsy fingers he tried to adjust the hair-band.

"Let me do it," she protested, "if you really want me to wear it."

"Well, don't _you_ want to?" he asked, a little hurt.

"I'd love to, if I may put it on properly. It's sweet."

"It makes you look awf'ly French!"