"And of course you never heard about Judge Krink," he said. "He was a man Pat invented when he was about five years old. He used to tell me that he wrote letters to Judge Krink and Judge Krink wrote letters to him. 'What did he say?' I'd ask him. 'Nothing,' said Pat. I remember Judge Krink had dirty fingernails. He never went to bed. I don't know just where he lived, but it was some place in a garden. He sat there and dug dirt. All the things that Pat couldn't do, Judge Krink did. Maybe I got asking him about Judge Krink too much because one day he said, 'I don't have Judge Krink any more. He's got table manners.'" "You see," broke in Maria, "it is not the truth when you said I do not even know him--my son. I have seen him many times. I have played with him." "Where?" asked Peter, puzzled. "At the house of the Judge Krink." Later they talked about themselves. Peter told Maria about Vonnie. Somehow he could not bear to have her think that he had been altogether desolated by her flight seventeen years ago or that he had spent his life entirely in persuading Pat to eat spinach. Certainly Maria was not displeased by the story. She smiled cheerfully when told of the devastation wrought by her phonograph record but she said, "Oh, Peter, you should not have let her go. I did not teach you enough or you would have broken the record of the song." Maria met confession with confession and rather overtopped Peter. "How about this God you were telling me about. Do you think he liked that?" he inquired. "Oh," said Maria, "it is not such little things about which he bothers." "Didn't you ever love me?" Peter protested. "Not after the baby," said Maria. "It was not your fault but in my heart I blamed you. It seemed to me the thing mean and silly. To be hurt so much, that cannot be good. Now I am not so sure. If he is to sing it cannot be too much. Nothing. Not even that." She moved to the piano and ran over an air which sounded familiar to Peter. "You remember?" she said. On a chance he guessed. "That's what you danced to in 'Adios'." "That is smart. You remember. It is the Invitation to the Waltz. All these years you have remembered." "When do you go back to the war?" she asked suddenly. "Tomorrow," said Peter. "It is seventeen years and you go away tomorrow." She came across the room and bending across the back of the chair in which Peter sat she kissed him on the eyes. "There is something more I want you to remember," she said. Peter was swept as he had been years ago by a gust of emotion. He started to get up but his legs were a little unsteady. Maria moved across the room to the piano. "Maybe," she said, "you will remember me for the seventeen years more if I sing 'Depuis Le Jour.'" CHAPTER III