"'My dear,' he said, 'we've got two of us to make the most of we can in this life: that's you and I. The world has got to teach us a number of things. Don't, in heaven's name, let's be trying to teach the wise old world.' "He leaned toward her and, elbow on his knee, he set looking at her. But she was looking a little by him, into the green of the room, and I guess past that, into the green of all outdoors. I got up and slipped out, without their noticing me, and I went through the house with one fact bulging out of the air and occupying my brain. And it was that sitting there beside him, with him owning her future like he owned his own, Robin's world was as different from Alex's as the world is from the Proudfits' conservatory. "I went up to Chris, in the pretty, pinky room next to Robin's and found him sitting up in bed and pulling the ties out of the down comforter, as hard as he could. I just stood still and looked at him, thinking how eating and drinking and creating and destroying seems to be the native instincts of everybody born. Destroying, as I look at it, was the weapon God give us so that we could eat and drink and create the world in peace, but we got some mixed up during getting born and we got to believing that destruction was a part of the process. "'Chris,' I says, 'what you pulling out?' "'I donno those names of those,' he says. 'I call 'em little pulls.' "'What are they for?' I ask' him. "'I donno what those are for,' he says, 'but they come out _slickery_.' "Ain't it funny? And ain't it for all the world the way Nature works, destroying what comes out _slickery_ and leaving that alone that resists her? I was so struck by it I didn't scold him none. "After a while I took him down for tea. On the way he picked up a sleepy puppy, and in the conservatory door we met the footman with the little tea wagon and the nice, drowsy quiet of the house went all to pieces with Chris in it:-- "'Supper, supper--here comes supper on a wagon, runnin' on litty wheels goin' wound an a-w-o-u-n-d--' says he, some louder than saying and almost to shouting. He sat down on the floor and looked up expectant: 'Five lumps,' he orders, not having belonged to the house party for nothing. "'Tell us about your day, Chris,' Robin asks. 'What did you do?' "'It isn't _by_, is it?' Chris says, anxious. 'To-day didn't stop yet, did it?' "'Not yet,' she reassures him. 'Now is still now.' "'I want to-day to keep being now,' Chris said, 'because when it stops, then the bed is right there. It don't be anywhere near to-night, is it?' he says. "'Not very near,' Robin told him. 'Well, then, what are you doing to-day?' she asks. "'I'm to the house's party,' he explained. 'The house is having its party. An' I'm to it.' "'Do you like this house, dear?' Robin asked.