rangwen waited outside, suspended, looking at the wild
waving of the trees in the wind and the gathering darkness. He
had his fate to follow, he lingered there at the threshold.

The child crouched distinct and motionless, curled in against
her mother, the eyes dark and unblinking among the keen wisps of
hair, like a curled-up animal asleep but for the eyes. The
mother sat as if in shadow, the story went on as if by itself.
Brangwen stood outside seeing the night fall. He did not notice
the passage of time. The hand that held the daffodils was fixed
and cold.

The story came to an end, the mother rose at last, with the
child clinging round her neck. She must be strong, to carry so
large a child so easily. The little Anna clung round her
mother's neck. The fair, strange face of the child looked over
the shoulder of the mother, all asleep but the eyes, and these,
wide and dark, kept up the resistance and the fight with
something unseen.

When they were gone, Brangwen stirred for the first time from
the place where he stood, and looked round at the night. He
wished it were really as beautiful and familiar as it seemed in
these few moments of release. Along with the child, he felt a
curious strain on him, a suffering, like a fate.

The mother came down again, and began folding the child's
clothes. He knocked. She opened wondering, a little bit at bay,
like a foreigner, uneasy.

"Good evening," he said. "I'll just come in a minute."

A change went quickly over her face; she was unprepared. She
looked down at him as he stood in the light from the window,
holding the daffodils, the darkness behind. In his black clothes
she again did not know him. She was almost afraid.

But he was already stepping on to the threshold, and closing
the door behind him. She turned into the kitchen, startled out
of herself by this invasion from the night. He took off his hat,
and came towards her. Then he stood in the light, in his black
clothes and his black stock, hat in one hand and yellow flowers
in the other. She stood away, at his mercy, snatched out of
herself. She did not know him, only she knew he was a man come
for her. She could only see the dark-clad man's figure standing
there upon her, and the gripped fist of flowers. She could not
see the face and the living eyes.

He was watching her, without knowing her, only aware
underneath of her presence.

"I come to have a word with you," he said, striding forward
to the table,