There came quick steps climbing stair carpet, two quick steps at the top on the linoleum, and the door opened. Emily Haye came in. She was red, red with forty years’ reckless exposure to the sun. Where neck joined body, before the swift V turned the attention to the mud-coloured jumper knitted by herself, there glowed a patch of skin turned by the sun to a deeper red. She was wearing rough tweeds, and she was smelling of soap, because it was near tea-time. He turns his head on the pillow, the nurse rises, and Mrs. Haye walks firmly up the room. “Well, how are you?” “All right, thanks.” “I’ll sit by him for a bit, nurse, you go and get your tea. It’s rainin’ like anything outside. I went for a walk, got as far as Wyleman’s barn, and there I turned and came back. Stepped in and saw Mrs. Green’s baby. It’s her first, so she’s making a fuss of it; beautiful baby, though. Have you been comfortable?” “Yes, thanks.” “Get any sleep?” “No.” “Is it hurting you much now?” “Just about the same.” “It’s too wretched for you, this thing comin’ right at the beginning of the holidays. I should be very angry, but you seem to be takin’ it calmly; you are always like that, you know, John, always hiding things. I was talking with the specialist just as he was going--and he says that you probably will not be able to go back to Noat next term. So you will miss your last term, which is so important they tell me. It means so much to you in after-life, or something. I know Ralph always used to say that it had meant a great deal to him, the responsibility and all that. But I expect you’re glad.” “Of course. Father may have had some responsibility, but they would never have given any to me, however long I stayed there. I was too incompetent. Can you imagine me enforcing authority?” “I think that you would be excellent in authority, I do really. But as Mabel Palmer was saying at tea the other day, you never seemed to have any of the ambition of ordinary boys--to be captain of football or cricket and so on. I did so want to be a boy when I was a girl. I wanted to be good at cricket, and they never let us play in those days.” “You would have made a fine cricketer, Mamma. But I don’t think you would have thought much of school life, if you had gone there. You wouldn’t have been as wretched as I was, but you would have seen through it, I think. You don’t judge people now by their goodness at games, do you?” “You know you weren’t wretched, and--oh, well, we mustn’t argue. John, what’s it like with that thing in front of your eyes so that you can’t see anything? What’s it feel like?” “I don’t know, everything’s black, that’s all.” What was it in the air? Why were they talking in long sentences, importantly? “I should go mad if I were like that, not to be able to see where one is going. John dear, you are very patient, I shouldn’t be nearly as good as you.” “I can quite imagine that. But it won’t be for so very long?” Why had he ended with a question?