He took off his heavy boots and lit his pipe and seemed childishly glad to be home again. But he didn't talk much. He sighed luxuriously and smiled at her in his odd new way, yet he was interested in the excellent supper she gave him presently and in the account she furnished of the business which was still on an ascending curve of prosperity. The old wound, still unhealed, would not allow her to praise her father, but there was more than one instance to offer of that tardy repentance; and it was hard to repress a note of pride when she announced that he was now Mayor of Blackhampton and by all accounts a good one. She tried to get her husband to speak of France, but some instinct soon made it clear to her that he wanted to forget it. He could not be induced to speak of his experiences, made light of his "whiff of gas," but confessed it was hell all the time; he also said that the German was not a clean fighter. As he sat opposite to her, eating his supper, his reticence made it impossible for her to realize what he had been through. He did not seem to realize it himself, except that in a subtle way he was altogether changed. He was eight days at home and they spent a lot of the time together. They had a new kind of intimacy; the world of men and affairs had altered for them both. Everything came to them at a fresh angle. They were dwellers in another atmosphere. The most commonplace actions meant much more; events once of comparatively large importance meant much less. She half suggested that they should go up on Sunday afternoon to Strathfieldsaye, but the idea evidently did not appeal to him and she did not press it. Still she threw out the hint, because it was an opportunity to let bygones be bygones and she was sure that he would meet with a good reception. A sense of justice impelled her to be grateful to her father, much as she disliked him; in his domineering way he had tried to make amends; all the same she was not sorry that Bill was determined to hold himself aloof. It was not exactly that he bore a grudge against her father; at the point he had reached men did not bear grudges, but he had some decided views on the matter and they gained in power by not being expressed. On the afternoon of Wednesday, which was early closing day in Blackhampton, Bill insisted on taking Melia to the Art Gallery. It was in the historic low-roofed building in New Square--which dated from the Romans--known as the old Moot Hall. It was now the home of one of the finest collections of pictures in the country. Among ancient masterpieces and some modern ones were several characteristic examples of his friend, Stanning, R.A., whom he had carried dying into a dugout not four months ago.