Page:All Kneeling (1928).pdf/68

 ting were fairly recent purchases, the books on whose fly-leaves she had written Christabel Caine in large childish letters.

"Spring in England"

"Oh! Primroses in the hedges—wet primroses with tall pink stems and crisp ruffled leaves!"

She could hear her voice, charming, with a little breathless catch in it now and then. She did not so much think, I am like a primrose, as hope some of the gentlemen were thinking it. Like a primrose, innocently gay, fresh, touching

She outstayed the others. Even Elliott's nervous offers to take her home had no effect.

"Don't send me away, my dear. I have something I must say to you. Help me!"

"I certainly will, if you'll tell me"

"It is so foolishly hard! And I ought to be able to say it as easily, as simply, as a bird sings, as those primroses bloom."

"I"