“You’re late, children.” It was his mother talking. “We were getting nervous.”
He kissed her; for a moment, the old sense of security returned.
“It’s time Kay was in bed.”
She crossed the gravel path with her arm about the little girl, and disappeared up the white stone steps to the house.
Far away, as of old, like waves about the foot of a cliff, the roar of London threatened. It seemed to be telling him that he would not be always sheltered—that one day he would have to launch out, steering in search of the unknown future by himself. It was not the boldness, but the loneliness of the adventure that now impressed him.
“Father.”
“Yes.” The voice came to him out of the darkness. “What does it feel like to become a man?”
“Feel like, Peter! I don’t understand.”
“To have to—to have to fight for oneself?”
His father leant out and touched him. “Have you begun to think of that already? Fight for yourself! You won’t have to do that for a long while yet.”