Page:Thunder on the Left (1925).djvu/93

 The alert, attentive faces of the little girls were too much for her. They gaped over the palings. They knew (she felt sure) that something queer was happening. They always know, as calmly detached as nurses in a hospital who smile faintly at what the patients say under ether.

She hesitated, looking down at her ankles. How trim and orderly they were; when she put on those white silk stockings this morning she had had no idea of all this happening.

She heard the gate clash to, but still paused, her face averted. She wanted her eyes to reach his slowly. For after that it would be too late to plan things. There was a lonely marching in her blood. Then, trembling, she looked.

He wasn't there. He too had run on with the children. All four, far down the hill, romping to the beach together.