* * * * * Tent on the river-bank glowed saffron among the shadows. . . . Light vanished from the tent. . . . Moon, riding over Eynsham Bridge, saw it, a gray ghost by the gurgling weir. . . . Moon dipped behind the willows. . . . Sky lightened. . . . Stars faded. . . . Dyked pastures silvered to the dawn-gleams. . . . Sun-rim peeped over Eynsham Hills. . . . The tent-flap parted. . . . And out of the tent, stepping quietly lest she waken her sleeping mate, came a woman, golden hair unbound, white feet bare to the dew. . . . Very quietly she came, like a nymph in the dawn. . . . Very quietly, she sank to her white knees, alone on the river-bank by the gurgling weir. . . . Very quietly, she raised her white hands to the rising day. . . . “O God,” prayed Patricia, “dear God—let me give him a son.” EPILOGUE § 1 “Six thirty, ack emma, sir. Time to get up, sir.” James Garton, sometime driver in the Royal Field Artillery, now convalescing from wounds, on the Tebbits-Jameson farm, tapped his sleeping master on the left shoulder. Peter, waking with a start, looked round his comfortable dressing-room, at the mauve eiderdown on his bed, the bow-fronted wardrobe, the hunting prints on the walls. “Lord, Garton! What on earth are you playing at? We aren’t on active service now.” “No, sir.” The Yorkshireman grinned. “I don’t think there’ll be much active service after today, sir. Not if the Huns sign this armistice”—he pronounced the word armistïce—“the newspapers are talking about.” “Thought I’d like to wake you for the last morning of the war, sir,” Garton went on, producing a cup of tea and some biscuits. “Should I put out your riding-kit, sir?” “No, Garton, you should not”—laughed Peter, falling in with the spirit of the game—“you should put out the blue suit of mufti you’ll find in that wardrobe. Also, you should prepare my bath.” Said the Yorkshireman, hanging serge slacks carefully over the back of a chair, “Mister Harry says that you and Mrs. Jameson are sure to get taken up for joy-riding, sir.” “That be damned for a tale.” Peter, tea finished, tumbled out of bed; stuck his feet into a pair of red morocco slippers; drew silk dressing-gown over pyjamas. They had been speaking very quietly for fear of waking the pair in the next room: but now a voice, Patricia’s voice, called through the doorway:— “Time to get up, Peter. Are you awake, Peter?” “Of course I’m awake. Been awake for hours. How’s Peter the Fourth?” “Slept like a top.” The door opened, revealing Patricia, slipperless, golden hair falling about her white shoulders. “What on earth. . . .” Garton, blushing furiously, fled: they heard him busy in the bath-room as they kissed good-morning. “Funny fellow, isn’t he?” Peter explained his quondam servant’s presence. “And now let’s have a look at the heir.”