September, and it was the last week in August now. Mark and Mamma were
always looking for each other. Mamma would come running up to the
schoolroom and say, "Where's Mark? Tell Mark I want him"; and Mark would
go into the garden and say, "Where's Mamma? I want her." And Mamma would
put away her trowel and gardening gloves and go walks with him which she
hated; and Mark would leave Napoleon Buonaparte and the plan of the
Battle of Austerlitz to dig in the garden (and he loathed digging) with
Mamma.

This afternoon he had called to Mary to come out brook-jumping. Mark
could jump all the brooks in the fields between Ilford and Barkingside,
and in the plantations beyond Drake's Farm; he could jump the Pool of
Siloam where the water from the plantations runs into the lake below
Vinings. Where there was no place for a little girl of seven to cross he
carried her in his arms and jumped. He would stand outside in the lane
and put his hands on the wall and turn heels over head into the garden.

She said to herself: "In six years and five months I shall be fourteen. I
shall jump the Pool of Siloam and come into the garden head over heels."
And Mamma called her a little humbug when she said she was afraid to go
for a walk with Jenny lest a funeral should be coming along the road.


II.

The five elm trees held up their skirts above the high corn. The flat
surface of the corn-tops was still. Hot glassy air quivered like a thin
steam over the brimming field.

The glazed yellow walls of the old nursery gave out a strong light and