on. It was his only way of keeping
her--and he could not let her go. She was adorable, and the years
between them meant nothing--her beauty had wiped them out. He could
think of her only as the ageless woman he loved, who shared the passion
of his own youth and in it was for ever young.

On the practical side, too, he was better reconciled. He felt a pang
of regret when he thought of London and its work and pleasures, of his
chances of a "rise"--which his superiors had hinted was now
imminent--of a head clerkship, perhaps eventually of a partnership and
a tight marriage into the business--since his Whitsuntide visit to
Ansdore he had met the junior partner's daughter and found her as
susceptible to his charms as most young women. But after all, his
position as Joanna Godden's husband would be better even than that of
a partner in the firm of Sherwood and Son. What was Sherwood's but a
firm of carpet-makers?--a small firm of carpet-makers. As Joanna's
husband he would be a Country Gentleman, perhaps even a County
Gentleman. He saw himself going out with his gun ... following the
hounds in a pink coat.... He forgot that he could neither shoot nor
ride.

Meantime his position as Joanna's lover was not an unenviable one. She
adored him and spoiled him like a child. She poured gifts upon him--a
gold wrist-watch, a real panama hat, silk socks in gorgeous colours,
boxes and boxes of the best Turkish and Egyptian cigarettes--she could
not give him enough to show her love and delight in him.

At first he had been a little embarrassed by this outpouring, but he was
used to receiving presents from women, and he knew that Joanna had
plenty of money to spend and really got as much pleasure out of her
gifts as he did. They atoned for the poverty of her letters. She was no
letter-writer. Her feelings were as cramped as her handwriting by the
time she had got them down on paper; indeed, Joanna herself was
wondrously expressed in that big, unformed, constricted handwriting,
black yet uncertain, sprawling yet constrained, in which she recorded
such facts as "Dot has calved at last," or "Broadhurst will be 61 come
Monday," or--as an utmost concession--"I love you, dear."

However, too great a strain was not put on this frail link, for he came
down to Ansdore almost every week-end, from Saturday afternoon to early
Monday morning. He tried to persuade her to come up to London and stay
at his mother's house--he had vague hopes that perha