Page:The White Peacock, Lawrence, 1911.djvu/406

398 you remember what they say at home?—‘One for sorrow.’ Very often one solitary creature sits on the telegraph wires. I almost hate him when I look at him. I think my badge for life ought to be—one crow——.”

Again, a little later:

“I have been home for the week-end. Isn’t it nice to be made much of, to be an important cherished person for a little time? It is quite a new experience for me.

“The snowdrops are full out among the grass in the front garden—and such a lot. I imagined you must come in the sunshine of the Sunday afternoon to see them. It did not seem possible you should not. The winter aconites are out along the hedge. I knelt and kissed them. I have been so glad to go away, to breathe the free air of life, but I felt as if I could not come away from the aconites. I have sent you some—are they much withered?

“Now I am in my lodgings, I have the quite unusual feeling of being contented to stay here a little while—not long—not above a year, I am sure. But even to be contented for a little while is enough for me——.”

In the beginning of March I had a letter from the father:

“You’ll not see us again in the old place. We shall be gone in a fortnight. The things are most of them gone already. George has got Bob and Flower. I have sold three of the cows, Stafford, and Julia and Hannah. The place looks very empty. I don’t like going past the cowsheds, and we miss hearing the horses stamp at night. But I shall not be sorry