"Don't let's talk about Frederic. I am so happy." Serge began to sing. He had very fine deep notes, but his voice failed him in the upper register, and whenever it cracked he laughed, and when he laughed Annette had to join in. He could never remember any song through to the end, and he invented the most absurd words. Then over a long stretch, as he rowed, he sang a melancholy canoe-song in a minor key that he had heard on the Zambesi. He sang it over and over again. "I like that," said Annette. "Do you know, often when I'm in the kitchen I think I'm in a boat sailing away and away. It's like dreaming, only it goes on and on . . ." "That's love." "Is it? . . . That's nonsense. I'm not in love." "Not _in_ love, my dear. But it's love all the same! Your little soul growing and expanding, trying to find an outlet, a channel that will lead it to warmth and the sun . . ." "You make me feel unhappy when you talk like that." "You're wiser than I am, Annette. You accept things where I think about them." "We mustn't lose the others." "We shan't lose them. They'll have to come on until they find us. If I thought that Fry was rowing I'd take him ten miles, but I'm pretty sure he isn't." "You don't like him." "No. Do you?" "No. But he's very pleasant." "You can admire what you don't like?" "I like to admire people. When I'm working it's pleasant to remember the things they do and say, and the way they say them." "So you're a pleased and uncritical audience of the doings in Fern Square?" Annette dodged the question. She gave a long sigh, and said: "I am enjoying myself; but I like best being alone with you. It's such a glorious day." And then she began to tell him some of the stories she composed about him for Deedy Fender's benefit. When she had done she added: "Of course, I never imagined anything like you." "Are you disappointed?" "Oh! no." They came to a great wood growing down to the water's edge. Serge ran the boat into the bank and moored her. He filled his pipe and began to smoke, then lay back with his head on the little seat in the bows. Annette sat with her hands in her lap, and they basked in the hot sun and felt that it was very good. The birds were very merry in the trees. In the trees the wind whispered songs gathered from the sea only twenty miles away. Over all blazed the sun. Flies danced above the water. All was harmony and peace. Round the bend of the river came the other boat. Bennett Lawrie and Basil Haslam were rowing. Mary was steering, and on each side of her were Minna and Herbert Fry. Fry called out: "You've led us a nice dance. It is an hour past lunch time." Serge grinned and shouted pleasantly: "All the better for eating, my dear." The big boat bumped into the dinghy and moored alongside. The luncheon-basket was hauled out, and on the grass under the trees a cloth was spread. They sat round it, and for some time were silent until their hunger began to be appeased.