“She likes her cup o’ tea, your old Nan does, Master John. I always have been partial to a cup o’ tea. All through the time when you was in the nursery it helped me along, for you was a bad boy then. An’ before that, when you used to lie ’elpless in my arms with yer little red face. Lor’, you would ’oller too if yer milk was so much as a minute late. I remember ...” She was remembering. Why were they all remembering? But perhaps it was an occasion to do so. They looked back into a past that lived only in their memories, they did not see the present, the birth of a new life, of a new art, and his life which had changed so suddenly. But he had lived his life, as Nan had lived hers, he must now look back. And it would be so comfortable being sentimental, and talking about memories. For to look back was the only thing left, to look forward was like thinking of nothing. Still, it could not all be over, there must be something in the future, something beyond these black walls! Romantic again. She too, “... with yer grasp in yer little hand ...” she was maudlin. Magdalen, he was to have gone there. Oxford. No. Prehensile, that is all a baby is, and the nurse a ministrant at the knees of Moloch, the supreme sentimentalist. But her feelings were hurt so easily, and her tears were terrible. He must be good. “... a lovely baby ...” “What is there for tea, Nan?” “Well, I thought you might like buttered toast and bread and butter, you always was that fond of at nursery teas, and the Easter cake ...” “I’ll break the rules and have a bit of that first, Nan, please.” She cuts a slice and begins to feed him bit by bit, at intervals putting the teacup into his hands. She loves doing it. For years she has watched him getting more and more independent, and now she is feeding him again. It is nice. Her hand trembles, she has been garrulous and reminiscent, while she is usually sparing of unnecessary words. She has been told that he is blind, of course that’s it. So that will mean more sympathy, if not expressed--which would be intolerable--at any rate only just underneath the surface. But how could you escape it? There were the people who had seen him grow up, and who inevitably had a possessive interest in him. They cared for him through no fault of his own, like dogs, and were sorry for the pain they felt in themselves at his blindness. They were busy dramatising it all to him, while he wanted to be alone, alone to patch up his life. And now he was being theatrical! “Would you like a sip of tea again, Master John?” “Thanks, and some buttered toast.” “I do so love feeding ye, Master John, like I used to with the bottle. I remember ...”