But it was a question of petticoats. He realized it when he saw Baby sprawling in the safe hollow of her lap. He had meant to tell Winny that she mustn't stay; but she had him by those absurd petticoats of hers, and behind her petticoats he shielded himself from the upbraidings of his sanity. But Winny knew. She was not going to stay, to be there with him more than was strictly necessary. When, with exquisite gentleness, she had inserted Baby into all his little vests and things, she put on him his knitted Baby's coat and hat, and gave him to Ranny to hold while she arrayed Dossie in her Sunday best. Then she packed them both into the wonderful pram, and wheeled them out into the Avenue, far from Ranny. For she knew that Ranny didn't want her. He wanted to be left alone to think. CHAPTER XXIV He had been incapable of thinking until now, the first moment (since it had happened) that he had been left alone. Last night the thing had stupefied him so that he could not think. If he had tried to describe what had been before him last night, he would have said there was a lot of cotton wool about. It had been all like wool, cotton wool, nothing that the mind could bite on, nothing that it could grasp. Last night Winny had been there, and that had stopped his thinking. It was absurd to say that what had happened had disturbed his night's rest. What had disturbed his night's rest had been his fear lest he should forget to feed Baby. And in the morning there had been too many things to do, there had been Dossie and Baby. And then Winny again. And now they were all gone. There was silence and a clear space to think in. His brain too was clear and clean. The clouds of cotton wool had been dispersed in his movements to and fro. As an aid to thinking he brought out of his breast pocket Violet's letter. He spread it on the table in the back sitting-room and sat down to it, seriously, as to a document that he would have to master, a thing that would yield its secret only under the closest examination. He was aware that he had not by any means taken it all in last night. That she had gone off with Leonard Mercier, _that_ he had indeed grasped, _that_ he knew. But beyond that the letter gave him no solid practical information. It did not and it was not meant to give him any clue. In going off Violet had disappeared and had meant to disappear. He gathered from it that she had been possessed by one thought and by one fear, that he would go after her and bring her back. "What on earth," he said to himself, "should I go after her for?"