t he had now
his excuse for going home.

Towards half past six each evening came a "gasgacha" of bells--a
cascade of tumbling chimes, mounting from the city below and falling
back chime on chime. After listening to them on the fourth day he said
suddenly:

"I'd like to be back in England, Mum, the sun's too hot."

"Very well, darling. As soon as you're fit to travel." And at once he
felt better, and--meaner.

They had been out five weeks when they turned towards home. Jon's head
was restored to its pristine clarity, but he was confined to a hat
lined by his mother with many layers of orange and green silk, and he
still walked from choice in the shade. As the long struggle of
discretion between them drew to its close, he wondered more and more
whether she could see his eagerness to get back to that which she had
brought him away from. Condemned by Spanish Providence to spend a day
in Madrid between their trains, it was but natural to go again to the
Prado. Jon was elaborately casual this time before his Goya girl. Now
that he was going back to her, he could afford a lesser scrutiny. It
was his mother who lingered before the picture, saying:

"The face and figure of the girl are exquisite."

Jon heard her uneasily. Did she understand? But he felt once more that
he was no match for her in self-control and subtlety. She could, in
some supersensitive way, of which he had not the secret, feel the pulse
of his thoughts; she knew by instinct what he hoped and feared and
wished. It made him terribly uncomfortable and guilty, having, beyond
most boys, a conscience. He wished she would be frank with him; he
almost hoped for an open struggle. But none came, and steadily,
silently, they travelled north. Thus did he first learn how much better
than men women play a waiting game. In Paris they had again to pause
for a day. Jon was grieved because it lasted two, owing to certain
matters in connection with a dressmaker; as if his mother, who looked
beautiful in anything, had any need of dresses! The happiest moment of
his travel was that when he stepped on to the Folkestone boat.

Standing by the bulwark rail, with her arm in his, she said:

"I'm afraid you haven't enjoyed it much, Jon. But you've been very
sweet to me."

Jon squeezed her arm.

"Oh! yes, I've enjoyed it awfully--except for my head lately."

And now that the end had come, he really had, feeling a sort of glamour
over the past weeks--a kind of painful pleasu