‘I had a letter from him this morning. It’s pure agony for Roddy to answer an invitation, even, so I was flattered. He and I and one or two other chaps are going to do some sailing next month, off the Isle of Wight, and he actually wrote to make arrangements.’ ‘What fun that will be, Martin.’ She bowed her head over the plate in her lap, crumbling a scone to fragments. ‘Why don’t you come too, Judith? Do! It’d be perfectly proper wouldn’t it, Mummie? We’re her bachelor uncles.’ It was precisely at those words, at the unexpected recalling of all that light-heartedness, that happiest day of all, that the thing leapt to life within her, and fiercely, horribly pressed towards birth. Oh, now there was no hope. Roddy had arisen all in a moment from his false burial. With a vast effort she prevented her eyes from closing quite; but to speak was impossible. ‘Roddy says----’ began Martin, glanced across at her, and stopped uncertainly, startled. He was silent, and then said: ‘Tired, Judith?’ ‘A bit--after my journey--it’s so hot to travel. Isn’t it?’ She turned to his mother. ‘Yes, my dear, it is,’ she said cooingly. ‘Come, I’ll take you to your room and you shall rest till dinner.’ Martin had got up and was hovering over her, anxious and despondent. But she could smile at him now, and she said: ‘I’d rather go out if I may, and get cool. The garden looks so lovely.’ ‘That’s right then,’ said Martin’s mother encouragingly. ‘Take her out, Martin darling, and shew her the rock-garden. Martin and I have been making a rock-garden, Judith--I may call you Judith, mayn’t I?’ She laid a hand again on Judith’s arm. ‘It’s such fun. Martin and I are both ridiculous potterers and experimenters. Are you like that?’ ‘Not practically, I’m afraid.’ ‘Ah, well, it’s a delightful hobby. It keeps me busy and healthy, doesn’t it, Martin?’ She looked up into his face, and he put a large hand upon her little shoulder. ‘There,’ she added, ‘Run along now. Don’t let Martin take you in the fields or up to his precious farm: you’ll spoil your pretty shoes. Aren’t they darling shoes, Martin? And such a _pretty_ frock.’ With little pats and handwavings and vague benevolence she saw them out of the French windows down the steps into the garden. * * * * * Martin said: ‘Wait. I’ll take a gun. We’re simply tripping over rabbits this year. It’s awful.’ She did not hear properly; nor, when Martin came back to her, did she grasp the significance of the gun over his shoulder. He led her out of the garden by a wooden bridge over a stream half-hidden in forget-me-nots, kingcups and iris plants; through the meadow where grazed the pedigree cows which, so he said, were his mother’s pride; over a stile and up on to the chalky rabbit-pitted hillside.