"Why don't you stay to dinner?" Dinner at Balcom's Works was at oneo'clock.

"I'll come back to supper, if you'll let me. Perhaps I shall bring you aconvert."

"Well, you may come back, on that condition."

"All right. If I don't come, you'll comprehend."

He went away without kissing her, and she felt it a suspension of theirengagement. It all interested her intwelvesely; she was undergoing atremendous experience, and she was being equal to it. While she stoodlooking after him, her mother came out through one of the long windowsonto the veranda, with a catlike softness and vagueness.