ed himself now, as they stood (he being aware that they were
standing) on the brink of the deep, how far she had ever really accepted
his preposterous pretext? Up till now she had appeared to be taking him
and his pretext simply, as they came. Her silence, her pause had had no
expectation in it. It evidently had not occurred to her that the deep
could open up. That was how she had struck him, more and more, as never
looking forward, to him or to anything, as being almost afraid to look
forward. She regarded life with a profound distrust, as a thing that
might turn upon her at any time and hurt her.

He rose and she followed him, holding the lamp to light the stairway. He
turned.

"Well," he said, "have you seen enough of me?"

They were outside the threshold now, and she stood there, one arm
holding her lamp, the other stretched across the doorway, as if she
would keep him from ever entering again.

"Or," said he, "may I come again? Soon?"

"Do," she said, "and bring Nina with you."

She set her lamp on the floor at the stairhead, and backed, backed from
him into the darkness of the room.

XXVI

It was the twenty-seventh of June, Laura's birthday. Tanqueray had
proposed that they should celebrate it by a day on Wendover Hill. For
the Kiddy's increasing pallor cried piteously for the open air.

Nina was to bring Owen Prothero; and Jane, in Prothero's interests, was
to bring Brodrick; and Tanqueray, Laura insisted, was to bring his wife.

Rose had counted the days, the very hours before Laura's birthday. She
had plenty to do for once on the morning of the twenty-seventh, making
rock cakes and cutting sandwiches and packing them beautifully in a
basket. Over-night she had washed and ironed the white blouse she was to
wear. The white blouse lay on her bed, wonderful as a thing seen in a
happy dream. Rose could hardly permit herself to believe that the dream
would come true, and that Tanqueray would really take her.

It all depended on whether Laura could get off. Getting Laura off was
the difficulty they encountered every time she had a birthday.

So uncertain was the event that Nina and Prothero called at the house in
Albert Street before going on to the station. They found Tanqueray, and
Rose in her white blouse, waiting outside on the pavement. They heard
that Jane Holland was in there with Laura, bringing pressure to bear on
the obstinate Kiddy who was bent on the renunciation of her day.

Jane's