e charge of them when we
turned out of the vicarage."

"I hope you put your pinafore on," said her husband.

He took her by the hands and raised her to her feet, and Isabel
with irreproachable docility began to collect her scattered
belongings, her sable scarf and mull and veil. Lawrence
forestalled her. "Mayn't I even carry my own gloves?" Isabel
pleaded. "No, you're so slow," said Lawrence laughing down at
her. Isabel's cheeks flew their scarlet flag before the invading
enemy. "Isabel," Lawrence murmured, "are you shy of me?"

"A little. I'm only twenty," Isabel excused herself.

"And I'm not gentle. I shall brush the bloom off. . . . Yet I
love the bloom."

He went to close the window. A breath of night wind shook
through the bushes on the lawn and blew off a snow of petals
through the soft air. He was not a believer in the immortality
of the soul, but tonight he would have given much to know that
Val was near him, a spirit of smiling tenderness. But no: the
night was empty of everything except moonlight and petals and the
sighing of wind over diapered turf. Youth passes, and beauty, and
bloom: it is of the essence of their sweetness that they cannot
last. Yet, while they last, how sweet they are!

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