Perhaps, sometimes, she really missed him a little. They had had great
fun together; she looked upon him as a friend; not only that, but he
knew that he amused her, that she liked him, thought him clever,
and--admired him even.

But that was all. Yet she _could_ have cared for him. He knew that. And
not only in one way, but in every way. They could have been comrades
interested in the same things; they had the same sense of humour, much
the same point of view. She would have made him, probably,
self-restrained and patient as she was, in certain things. But, in
others, wouldn't he have fired her with his own ideas and feelings, and
violent passions and enthusiasms!

She was to be always with Bruce! That was to be her life!--Bruce, who
was almost indescribable because he was neither bad, nor stupid, nor
bad-looking. He had only one fault. _'Il n'a qu'un défaut--il est
impossible,'_ said Aylmer aloud to himself.

He took up a book--of course one of _her_ books, something she had lent
him.

* * * * *

Now it was time to go out again--to dinner. He couldn't; it was too
much effort. Tonight he would give way, and suffer grief and desire and
longing like a physical pain. He hadn't heard from her lately. Suppose
she should be ill? Suppose she was forgetting him entirely? Soon they
would be going away to some summer place with the children. He stamped
his foot like an angry child as he imagined her in her thin summer