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Robin’s face that came to her; Robin startled, frightened, his happiness all broken. That was what Hester had done to Robin; and she must not do it to Clive again. She was always breaking Clive’s happiness. It grew up; it sought the light—and she broke it off. It was cruel; she must not be cruel. ‘Help me not to be cruel,’ she muttered, with the child habit of prayer that had never left her. And, as he came in, she saw that Clive, too, had equipped himself. He was pale, but he was smiling, and he came towards her almost as little Robin had done, almost as if he was calling out to her and wanted her. Then, as he took her hands, his face altered: ‘Why, Mummy,’ he faltered, ‘you’ve been crying.’

She had not known it. She was unaware of tears in her eyes and on her cheeks. Was it not only that her hot parched gaze betrayed her?

‘Crying, Clive?’ she, too, faltered.

‘Yes— what is it? Oh, Mummy—are you so unhappy?’

They were back, mother and son, in the past; but she now seemed the child, for she was in his arms and the tears had come indeed and though she still heard herself saying, far away, ‘Help me not to be cruel,’ she was sobbing helplessly.