Then, after a while: "And I shall come next Saturday, and shall bring my father ?" "I suppose he wants to come," she replied.

"At any rate, if he does you'll have to let him." He kissed her again, and stroked the hair from her temples, gently, tenderly, as if she were a lover.
"Shan't you be late ?" she murmured.
"I'm going," he said, very low.
Still he sat a few minutes, stroking the brown and grey hair from her temples.
"And you won't be any worse, mother ?" "No, my son." "You promise me ?" "Yes; I won't be any worse." He kissed her, held her in his arms for a moment, and was gone.

In the early sunny morning he ran to the station, crying all the way; he did not know what for.

And her blue eyes were wide and staring as she thought of him.
In the afternoon he went a walk with Clara.

They sat in the little wood where bluebells were standing.