"It is this." His smile, briefly sardonic, mocked at himself. "That children are the world's greatest illusion. The largest catch-penny life offers." "Sometimes," Catherine hesitated, "I think Henry says a clever thing to fool herself." "Isn't it more than clever? Don't you feel, when you are confronted with a black wall of futility, in yourself, that at least there are your children, three of them, and that they may jack life up to some level of significance, and that they are you?" "Is that an illusion?" "Isn't it? Our puny little minds, scratching at the edges of whatever it is that drives us along, pick up bits of sand." Bill laid his hand on the back of the chair, dragged it around, and dropped into it, his gaunt profile toward the window, his hands gripped on his knees. "After all, a merry-go-round doesn't go anywhere but around. Isn't that what this feeling amounts to? You don't find yourself convinced that you are the vehicle for your parents, do you? And yet"--the words lagged--"I am sure I have that illusion as strongly as any fool, that I have the need for that consolation." "Surely"--Catherine spoke softly; she mustn't drive him back--"you, of all people, Bill, are least futile." He turned his face toward her, a haggard little grin under his somber eyes. "What could be more futile? Builder of bridges and buildings, which a hundred other men can make better than I. I had a maudlin way, when I was younger, of expecting that to-morrow would give me the thing I wished. To-morrow! Another catch-penny. And this, too, puerile as it sounds. For a time Henrietta needed me, while she fought to get her toes in. But she's past that now." "Bill"--Catherine strained toward him, her eyes darkly brilliant--"I came home to-night, because I wanted you. Because when I am frantic and silly, you can pull me up. You have, countless times." "That is your generous imagination." Catherine flung out her hand impatiently. "And you see, I have, instead, spewed out this sentimental maundering." "Don't talk that way!" cried Catherine. "No." He rose abruptly, to stand above her, so that she tipped her head back, and one hand crept up to press against the pulse beating in her throat. His glance buffeted hers, entreating something, inarticulate, baffling. Then, suddenly, the old quiet mask was on again, and the water closed over his plunge within. "Don't ever be frantic, Catherine," he said. "Good night." She sat motionless when he had gone. Bill, in the dark, listening to the children. Bill, at the window, sending that heavy stare out into the night. Bill, stripped of his concealment. There was a slow brewing of exultation within her. He had come out, to her!