in Venice. I expect I shall come across you, Margery, with any luck. I
shan't start yet, though; I shall wait for better motoring weather. No,
I can't stop for tea, thanks; I'm going off for the week-end. Good-bye.
Good-bye, Margery. See you next in Venice, probably."

He was gone. Lucy sat still in her characteristic attitude, hands clasped
on her knees, solemn grey eyes on the fire.

"He's going away for the week-end," she said, realising it for herself
and Peter. "But it's more amusing when he's here. When he's in town, I
mean, and comes in. That's nice and funny, isn't it."

"Yes," said Peter.

"But one can go out into the streets and see the people go by--and that's
nice and funny too. And there are the Chinese paintings in the British
Museum ... and concerts ... and the Zoo ... and I'm going to a theatre
to-night. It's _all_ nice and funny, isn't it."

"Yes," said Peter again. He thought so too.

"Even when you and he are both gone to Italy," said Lucy, reassuring
herself, faintly interrogative. "Even then ... it can't be dull. It can't
be dull ever."

"It hasn't been yet," Peter agreed. "But I wish you were coming too to
Italy. You must before long. As soon as ..." He left that unfinished,
because it was all so vague at present, and he and Lucy always lived in
the moment.