Two or three days before, I had sent off a small picture to Katherine as a Christmas-box. It had taken me a long time to choose something I thought she might care for, and which at the same time pleased myself. In the end I had got her a photograph of Francia’s portrait of the boy Federigo Gonzaga, the son of Isabella d’Este――the Miserden Park picture. I had had it framed in a flat, dull, dark frame, and very carefully packed; and over and over again I had pictured her opening the parcel, her surprise. It was two days after Christmas when the postman brought me a letter from her, but instead of reading it, I put it in my pocket. It was a fairly thick packet, so, though her writing was very large, I knew it must be a long letter. I could feel it as it lay in the inner pocket of my jacket, and a dozen times that day I drew it out and inspected it, but no more than that, for I had determined not to read it till I went to bed. All day long I thought of the pleasure I should have, and in the end I became so impatient that I went to bed about nine o’clock. I put the letter on my pillow, and placed a lighted candle on the painted, deal chest-of-drawers beside my bed. I undressed, got into bed, and only then, with eager fingers, tore open the envelope and drew out its contents. I looked at them as they lay upon the bright, patch-work counterpane, a single sheet of note-paper, and a New Year card in the form of a pocket calendar. My disappointment was so great that for a little I did not even read the letter, but lay on my back and stared dismally at the iron rail at the foot of my bed. My thoughts were bitter. I recalled the many letters I had written to her, undiscouraged by her brief replies. Some of these had been pages long; the one I had sent with my present, for instance, I had given a whole evening to. I glanced at what she had written――three sides of a sheet of note-paper hastily scrawled over in huge characters, about two words to a line. She thanked me for my picture, which was very pretty. She would have liked to write me a really long letter, but there were some people staying in the house, and she had to look after them, and had only been able to snatch a moment to wish me a happy New Year. That was all. I blew out the candle and lay with my eyes wide open staring into the darkness. The few, conventional phrases of her letter were vivid in my mind. To begin with, the picture was not pretty; if it had been, I shouldn’t have bought it. If she had wanted me to have a happy New Year it would have been very easy for her to make it so. But it had been too much trouble. I thought of how I had sat up far into the night to finish my Christmas letter to her. I heard my father’s step on the stairs, the shutting of his bedroom door. I pulled the bed-clothes up to my chin, and as I did so my hand touched something――the pocket-calendar. I tore it in two and flung the pieces at the opposite wall.