“Peter, I shall always care for you more than any one--always whatever happens. But think, a time will come--I know it--when you'll have to watch me, to keep me by you, and even let your work go--everything, just for a time until I'm safe. I suppose that moment comes to most women in their married lives. But to me, when it happens, it will be worse than for most women because I've always had my way. You _mustn't_ let me have my way then--simply clutch me, be cruel, brutal, anything only don't let me go. Then, if you keep me through that, you'll always keep me.” To Peter it was almost as though she were talking in her sleep, something, there in the old, lumbering cab that was given to her by some one else to say something to which she herself would not give credit. “That's all right, you darling, you darling, you darling.” He covered her face, her eyes with kisses. “I'll never let you go--never.” He felt her quiver a little under his arms. “Don't mind, Peter, my horrible, beastly character. Just keep me for a little, train me--and then later I'll be such a wife to you, _such_ a wife!” Then she drew his head down. His lips touched her body just above her dress, where her cloak parted. She whispered: “There's something else.” She raised her face from his coat and looked up at him. Her cheeks were stained with crying and her eyes, large and dark, held him furiously as though he were the one place of safety. He caught her very close. “What is it?...” * * * * * That night, long after he, triumphant with the glory of her secret, had fallen asleep, she lay, staring into the dark, with frightened eyes. CHAPTER VI BIRTH OF THE HEIR I Peter's child was born on a night of frost when the stars were hard and fierce and a full moon, dull gold, flung high shadows upon the town. During the afternoon the fear that had been in Clare's eyes for many weeks suddenly flamed into terror--the doctor was sent for and Peter was banished from the room. Peter looked ludicrously, pitifully young as he sat, through the evening, in his room at the top of the house, staring in front of him, his face grey with anxiety, his broad shoulders set back as though ready for a blow; his strong fingers clutched the things on his writing-table, held them, dropped them, just like the hands of a blind man about the shining surface, tapping the wood. He saw her always as he had seen her last night when she had caught his arm crying--“If I die, Peter.... Oh, Peter, if I die!”... and he had comforted and stroked her hair, warming her cold fingers. How young she was, how tiny for this suffering--and it was he, he who had brought it upon her! Now, she was lying in her bed, as he had once seen his mother lie, with her hair spread about the pillow, her hands gripping the sheets, her eyes wide and black--the vast, hard bed-room closing her in, shutting her down--