One morning Stephen looked at Mary intently. ‘Come here. You’re not well! What’s the matter? Tell me.’ For she thought that the girl was unusually pale, thought too that her lips drooped a little at the corners; and a sudden fear contracted her heart. ‘Tell me at once what’s the matter with you!’ Her voice was rough with anxiety, and she laid an imperative hand over Mary’s. Mary protested. ‘Don’t be absurd; there’s nothing the matter, I’m perfectly well—you’re imagining things.’ For what could be the matter? Was she not here in Paris with Stephen? But her eyes filled with tears, and she turned away quickly to hide them, ashamed of her own unreason. Stephen stuck to her point. ‘You don’t look a bit well. We shouldn’t have stayed in Paris last summer.’ Then because her own nerves were on edge that day, she frowned. ‘It’s this business of your not eating whenever I can’t get in to a meal. I know you don’t eat—Pierre’s told me about it. You mustn’t behave like a baby, Mary! I shan’t be able to write a line if I feel you’re ill because you’re not eating.’ Her fear was making her lose her temper. ‘I shall send for a doctor,’ she finished brusquely. Mary refused point-blank to see a doctor. What was she to tell him? She hadn’t any symptoms. Pierre exaggerated. She ate quite enough—she had never been a very large eater. Stephen had better get on with her work and stop upsetting herself over nothing. But try as she might, Stephen could not get on—all the rest of the day her work went badly. After this she would often leave her desk and go wandering off in search of Mary. ‘Darling, where are you?’ ‘Upstairs in my bedroom!’ ‘Well, come down; I want you here in the study.’ And when Mary had settled herself by the fire: ‘Now tell me exactly how you feel—all right?’ And Mary would answer, smiling: ‘Yes, I’m quite all right; I swear I am, Stephen!’ It was not an ideal atmosphere for work, but the book was by now so well advanced that nothing short of a disaster could have stopped it—it was one of those books that intend to get born, and that go on maturing in spite of their authors. Nor was there anything really alarming about the condition of Mary’s health. She did not look very well, that was all; and at times she seemed a little downhearted, so that Stephen must snatch a few hours from her work in order that they might go out together. Perhaps they would lunch at a restaurant; or drive into the country, to the rapture of David; or just wander about the streets arm in arm as they had done when first they had returned to Paris. And Mary, because she would be feeling happy, would revive for these few hours as though by magic. Yet when she must once more find herself lonely, with nowhere to go and no one to talk to, because Stephen was back again at her desk, why then she would wilt, which was not unnatural considering her youth and her situation. 5