"What an awful day!" he said, drawing up a chair for her to the neglected fire. "Is it?" she inquired, blandly. "_Is_ it?" He walked to the window. "I hadn't noticed." She looked after him and beyond him, through the blurred window-panes. "Yes, it is rather rainy and blowy." "Hardly four o'clock, and dark as a wolf's mouth." "Yes, the sun sets early these days. I love the long evenings." She poked the low-burned fire till a feeble flame sprang up. He turned and looked at her through the twilight. "What do you do, little cousin, when you want to kill time?" She glanced over her shoulder with sudden gravity, shovel in hand. "Do you know, I think to 'kill time' is the most hideous, murderous phrase in the language. I wish you wouldn't use it." "What do you propose as a substitute?" "Just remembering how little time there is for all there is to do with it." (No coal left in the scuttle--she must go and tell Venie.) "Ah, yes," Ethan said, coming back and sitting down. "But suppose you haven't got a mission? Suppose nobody and nothing has any particular need of you?" "Oh, I wasn't thinking of missions and needs. I was just thinking of how much there was to see and--to--to feel--to _find out about_! Enough to last a million years, and we aren't given (in this life) a hundred." Gloom settled down upon her face. "I think it's simply awful that we're allowed so little time. Even elephants and ravens are better off." He looked into her woe-begone countenance, and began to shake with laughter. "Well, well, this _is_ the other side of the shield." Val was disconcerted at his mirth. "I'm glad to see you so cheerful about it," she said. "_I_ think it's simply tragic." "You observe that even such optimism as yours has its dark side too." "Dark? Yes, coal-black, but never dull." She spoke with great solemnity. "No matter what comes, it can't help being frantically interesting." "How can you be sure of that? You may be--" He stopped. "How can I be sure? Why, just because, don't you see, it will be happening to _me_. That makes it quite new--makes it tremendous." She studied the dark enigmatic face, and her radiance paled a trifle. "You said so yourself the other night." "_I_ said so?" "Don't you remember?--about everybody being different." "Different? Yes." "Oh, that made me so happy." She bent towards him, beaming again. "I so love thinking that none of the dull old rules hold for me--that I'm the first one of this sort. What did for other people won't do for me--what happened to them needn't make me afraid. Oh, it's splendid to think it's all new and different because of me!" She pressed her hands together, and her face, yes, it was like a lamp in the gathering gloom. "I wonder what you'll do with your life?" said the man, with something very tender in the low voice.