"I known girls be left," she muttered, "girls like me. They pulled through somehow. But I don't think they was fond of the men like I am of him. And you say he's fond of me. I know there isn't anybody else." "Is that all you care about?" "He's never looked at anybody else. I'd feel better if he did. What call has he to go and make trouble if there isn't anybody else? Lots of girls would have chucked work when they'd found a man like that to live on. They get sick of being on their own. I've been on my own since I was sixteen, and I couldn't give it up for anybody." "And yet you expect him to give it up?" "No, I don't. I expect him to stand by me, that's all. I have my feelings too. He's not the only person in the world with feelings. I'm very fond of him, Mr. Kilner, but sometimes I think he's a bit soft, and I do hate a softy. Ooh! I'll be late." She walked swiftly away. Very young she looked. She moved not gracefully, but with a birdlike energy that was pleasing. Kilner, surveying her figure, approved of it, until he came to her shoulders. They were slightly stooping and rounded, and she swung them awkwardly as she walked. "Ugly and weak," said Kilner to himself. "Stooping over an infernal machine. Taken something out of her. Not her spirit. Given her a cramped habit of body. Nonsense. No good trying to account for it. He is simply not in love with her, never has been, nor she with him." He went up to his room and found it empty. No René. No sign of him at Ann's. He had not been seen at the yard. His car was out with a temporary driver. A child in the mews had seen him in the main road. He had gone into a tobacconist's and then climbed on a bus. The tobacconist remembered his coming in to get change for a sovereign. He looked rather strange and excited. "It's a fine day," said the tobacconist. "Fine, be blowed," replied René. "It's as empty as hell." "I wouldn't say that," said the tobacconist, "with the sun shining." "But I do say it," insisted René. "You couldn't call that shining." And then another customer came in. Kilner had some knowledge of his friend's ways and haunts, but he sought in vain. He met Ann in the evening with his news. She looked scared and protested: "He's gone to his home. He must have gone to his home. You could tell he was always fond of his mother." "What makes you think that?" "He wouldn't go anywhere else." "Did he talk about his home?" "Hardly a word. But he told me he'd met his father. He's gone to his home. He'll be back." "I don't feel so sure about that." "Well, I know he'd never go back to the old life, books and all that. He said he never would. He said he'd learned more about econ-- What d'you call it?" "Economics." "That's it. He said he'd learned more through being with me than in four years' work at books and lectures." "I should call that an exaggerated statement." "He'll come back. I know he wouldn't see me left."