ctor laughed.

"Wait till you see London," he said. "You'll wonder more then."

She got up from the table suddenly and stood in the window while the
doctor went on eating philosophically and smiling at her as he wished
he could go all the way to Australia with her and watch her growing
wonderment at the world.

"You know," she said doubtfully, "it seems so queer--all these people,
and then that monument. I don't see the connection, somehow."

"I see you standing there, and a lump of congealing mutton on your plate
here," said the doctor, and she sat down and ate a mouthful hurriedly.

"But what is the connection? What are they for?"

The doctor watched her in his precise way with his eyes twinkling at her
over his glasses, which he wore on the end of his nose.

"I thought you were such a learned biologist, Marcella. Kraill would
tell you they were the caskets of questing cells--seeking about for
complementary cells that some day will themselves become the caskets of
cells."

"Ugh! That reminds me of all the clouds of flies on the dead fish in
summer," she said, pushing her plate away. "Flies--then maggots."

"Exactly!" said the doctor, chuckling.

"But--" she began, and broke off, frowning.

"Don't you see any connection between all yon little people and the
monument, though? A crawling mass of folks--and one or two stand out.
The others show they realize how these big ones stand out by making
monuments for them. It infers, I think, that they'd all like to tower
if they could."

"Ah, that's better. But so few tower."

"And that, Marcella, is just what I told you yon day we drove to
Pitleathy. They're all patched--or I should say _we're_ all patched.
Either bodily, mentally or spiritually there are holes torn in us, and
we've to be so busy patching them up from collapsing that we've no time
to grow. As time goes on and we learn better there'll be less patching.
There'll be more growing up tall and straight--everyone--there'll be
giants in those days, Marcella."

"Yes," she said slowly, and saw herself as one of them some day as she
drew on her gloves rather awkwardly, for they were the first pair she
had ever possessed. "Oh, well--I'm not going to be patched at all,
doctor. I simply won't have things tearing holes in me."

London, of course, was even more amazing than Edinburgh. They had a day
to spend there, and the doctor took her to Regent Street and Bond Street
in the morning. He was enjoying himsel