“No, I’ve never thought of it.” “You ought to.” “Why?” “Because four years makes a lot of difference in a woman. You’ll look still young when I’m turning forty.” “Pooh!” She ignored my attempt to turn from the topic. “If--if we should ever do anything rash, people would say that I was a scheming woman; that I’d taken advantage of you; that, being the elder, I ought to have known better.” The idea of Vi leading me astray was so supremely ridiculous that I laughed outright. Dorrie stirred, and gazed up in my face. “Dear Dante!” she muttered, and sank back again. “Her father will be waiting for the cable,” said Vi. I wondered if this was the kind of conversation my father and mother had carried on all those years ago when they ran away. I felt that if my arms were only free to place about her, all would be well. “We shall have to tell him, Vi,” I whispered. She pretended not to hear me. Her eyes were closed. One hand shaded them from the light. She was again playing hide-and-seek with the purpose of our errand. The rumble of the wheels droned on. I planned for what I would do when the train reached London and the moment of decision should arrive. Perhaps two hours passed in silence. The glare of London was growing in the distance. Towns and houses became more frequent. One had glimpses of illumined windows and silhouettes against the blinds. Each house meant a problem as large to someone as mine was to me. The fact that life was so teeming and various robbed my crisis of its isolated augustness. Locals met us with a crash like thunder. As we flashed by, I could glance into their carriages and see men and women, all of whom, at some time in their existence, would decide just such problems of love and self-fulfilment--to each one of them the decision would seem vital to the universe, and in each case it would be relatively trivial. How easy to do what one liked unnoticed in such a crowded world! How preposterous that theory of the man by the harbor! As if any God could have time to follow the individual doings of such a host of cheese-mites! Our fellow-traveler in the corner woke and removed the paper from before his eyes. “Wife tired?” “Yes, it’s a tedious journey.” It was too much trouble to correct him as to our exact relations. He cleared the misty panes and looked out at a vanishing station. “Stratford. We’ll be there in a quarter of an hour. Live in London?” “Yes. At least, sometimes.” He commenced to get his baggage together, keeping up his desultory volley of questions. We entered the last tunnel. I touched Vi’s hand. “We’re pulling into Liverpool Street. Do you want to claim your boxes to-night or to-morrow?” “To-morrow’ll do,” she said. A porter jumped on the step of our carriage. Our fellow-traveler alighted, refusing his assistance. The man climbed in and, shouldering our luggage, inquired whether we wanted a cab. “Where to?” he asked. I turned to Vi. “Where’ll we stay?”