When Peter laughed at her tenderly, attempting to coax her into braver thoughts, she clung to him, searching his face to discover the odd little boy who had asked such curious questions. For his sake she would smile through her tears, saying, “I'm just a silly woman, getting old, Peter. Don't think that I grudge you anything. I don't, I don't, only--only it's the first spreading of wings--the struggling out of the nest.” It was true--truer than she fancied; there was Cherry. However late he worked in those last days, however noiseless he made his feet upon the stairs, she heard him. Creeping from her room, she would stand white-robed beside his bed, stoop above his face on the pillow and tuck him up warmly. It wouldn't be for much longer--he was almost a man. And Billy--he tried to laugh her out of a sentiment which he fought down in himself. Manlike, he disguised his feelings. He took so much interest in the preparations, that it might have been he, instead of Peter, who was going up to Oxford. By day he pretended to be cheerful; but at night, when she lay down beside him, after her excursions to Peter's bedroom, he would take her in his arms, whispering the old endearments, “Golden little Nan,” and “Princess Pepperminta,” just to let her understand that, whoever went from her, he would be left. One October afternoon Mr. Grace, the herald of Topbury's great occasions, drew up against the pavement. Boxes were carried out. Cat's Meat shuffled away into the distance. At the end of the Terrace, Peter leant from the window; they were still there, waving from the steps. He had begged them not to come to the station; he knew they would break down. He turned the corner--his flight had begun in earnest. While familiar sights lasted, he was conscious not of adventure, but depression. Yes, that was the house from the dusk of whose garden a hand had stretched out to grasp him. Strange, and this was the same Christmas cab! Inanimate things hadn't changed; it was he who had altered.