“It will have to be done sooner or later,” he insisted. “And that’s that, as you say.” Until coffee was served they spoke rarely and of other matters. After coffee, in the living-room, she brought out a packet of stills to show him. They went over them, minutely, consulting, criticising, she explaining every picture and its relation to the continuity. “You should hear Mr. Creevy bellow, ‘Hold it! Hold it! D’ye think I told you to shimmy?’ Oh, he is rough, Barry. The first time I heard him bawl out, ‘Kill that nigger!’ I was terrified: I thought there was going to be a lynching----” They sat laughing uncontrollably at each other. “You imitate Creevy’s cracked contralto voice,” said Annan. “I didn’t know you were a mimic, Eris.” “Didn’t you?” And she laughed adorably. Then, suddenly, Ratford Creevy’s high-pitched, irritated voice came again from her lips: “‘Everybody! Everybody! Yaas, _you_, too, you poor dumbbell! Get on there.... Eris! Eris! My Gawd, where’s that amateur!... Well, where were you?... Well, stand up next time.... Lights!... Hey, where’s that amateur camera-man.... Where the hell’s Shunk? Emil! Emil!----’” His laughter and her own checked her and she leaned back, the stills sliding from her lap to the floor. Together they squatted down like two children to gather the litter of scattered photographs, interrupting to touch lips, lightly; and finally he dumped the stills onto a table and drew her to the lounge and gathered her close. “You know, sweet, the reasonable goal of real love is marriage. Don’t you know that?” “Darling!” “Isn’t it?” She looked at him uncertainly. “Isn’t it?” he insisted. “Sometimes.” “Always, ultimately. You realise that, don’t you, Eris?” “Y-es.... Ultimately it’s the goal. But----” “You love me enough to marry me, don’t you?” “Now?” “No, not now. Ultimately.” She said, pitifully: “I love you enough to marry you this moment.... But even if I were free you wouldn’t ask it, would you, Barry?” “I don’t know.” He looked intently at her. “It wouldn’t be any use, anyway,” he concluded. “Your work is more to you than I am. Isn’t it?” The girl laid her face against his shoulder in silence. “It’s your ruling passion, Eris, isn’t it?” “I--suppose so.... But there never can be any other man than you.” “You would make any sacrifice for your work, but you wouldn’t sacrifice your work for me, would you, Eris?” Her head only pressed his shoulder closer. He said: “You’ve starved for your work, gone almost in rags, slept in public parks----” “I’d do these for you.... I’ll give you anything, do anything for you--except----” “Except give up your work,” he ended drily. “I couldn’t love you if you made me do that,” she whispered. “If I _made_ you do it? Do you admit I could make you give it up?” he demanded almost arrogantly. She shrugged slightly: then raised her head and looked dumbly into his hard eyes.