i f6c06dd9cf3fe221 by Unknown (100 books to read in a lifetime .txt) 📗

he'll never get any out of that 'un. She's got ice in her veins; I don't need to have fallen seven times to know that. I bet that's what half the rows are over, too. Annie's lips quivered as she watched the doctor back towards the door.

"I want to come with you."

"I won't be a minute, Annie; I'm just going into the other room."

"Will you come back?"

"Of course I will."

"Now just look what I've got for you." Mrs. Summers took the situation in hand, and Rodney went out and into the cloakroom oft the hall, and washed his hands. It had been a mistake to bring the child here, but she had looked so pathetic, standing at the end of that grim street, waiting patiently for him to pass down the main road. And on a Christmas Eve, too; Christmas was made for children. He had had a vision of himself playing with her on the rug before the fire, and perhaps Stella laughing down at them from her chair . the perhaps had obliterated the vision. Annie's childish love, born of his kindness to her, had struck an answering chord in him. He wished he could do something for her, make her lot easier without causing comment. In his disappointment at Stella's reception of the child he realised that his intention had been to arouse her interest. There was so much she could do; there were so many like Annie. It" only ... Oh, it was hopeless!

Every move he made,

every suggestion, was tactfully turned aside. When he re-entered the drawing-room Stella was still standing by the fire-place, her face like a cameo against the black bog-oak. She gave off an air of delicacy, which made him wonder anew at the strength of so fragile a creature.

Why had things gone wrong between them?

Right from the beginning their temperaments had warred; not only in their physical relations but in their mental and everyday relations there were jarring notes. He wanted children; she couldn't have any.

Yet, after having had the necessary examinations, she had been found quite normal. He had seen to it that the fault didn't lie with him; but still, never a mention of one. He had wanted a home, a place where he could at least have a dog, but she had made this beautiful shell.

He wanted someone to talk to, someone who could enter into the desolation that was himself, or bring him out of it by their sympathy and understanding. He did not want to be led into the realms of mental phantasy by description of even the most commonplace things, which was the turn any conversation with her took. He liked poetry; but his poets were of a nature, so beefy, or style so simple, as to bring laughing derision on them. If only he and Stella could agree to differ; but this would seem to be the most difficult task of all.

Stella, still holding the letter in her hands, was impatient to give him the news. But she could not do it effectively while the atmosphere of the silly incident still prevailed; so she prepared her ground.

"Rodney, I'm sorry, dear, but children are so awkward. It would have upset us both if she had spilt or broken anything. You would then have blamed yourself for bringing her.... Don't you see?" She went to him and held up her face to be kissed.

"There! Am I forgiven for not wanting my Spode to be broken?" she said, laughing up at him.

"You're not angry with me any more? When you are angry you look like a black demon; it's a wonder children aren't afraid of you, instead of waiting at street corners for you." She had succeeded; he even looked gratified at her playfulness.

"Come on!" she urged, tweaking his nose.

He smiled at her, hope rising in him, anew, and he began to dutch wildly at straws again.

"I'm sorry, dear, I was nasty.

But if you could sec how some of those children live; twelve to fourteen people herded together in four rooms. Annie's lucky, in a way, there are only three of them; but she's got a beast of a grandfather. I attended him for eight months when his leg was smashed up. I used to loathe the thought of touching him: he always gave me the impression of being a gigantic snake; it's his eyes, I think. I can never understand how he came to be the father of. "

"Look, darling," Stella broke in gently, "Mary's taking the dinner in, and I want to tell you my little bit of news.... Read that 1' She thrust the letter towards him, and stood, her hands behind her back, gazing up at him in a little-girl attitude while he read it.

"Why, Stella, I didn't even know you had sent the book away. Oh, I am glad."

Guessing how much this meant to her, he tried to appear thrilled at the news, thrusting down the dread that it would create another milestone between them. Taking her into his arms, he kissed her.

"Congratulations, my dear.... Well!" he said, reading the letter again while standing with one arm around her shoulders.

"And they would like another at your leisure! I say, you're famous!"

"Rodney, don't be silly 1' " But it's no easy thing to get a book of poems published. Stories, yes; but publishers are very wary of poems.

"

"But they are so simple."

"Simple or not, they like them."

To Stella's chagrin, she realised that his amazement was not so much at her writing the poems as the publisher accepting them. Simple or not!

he had said. Would Herbert Barrington have given that retort?

Never. But in Rodney's estimation Herbert Barrington was an effeminate sop. He didn't know that it was on Herbert's advice