After tea, they were all gathered for a walk.
“Would you like to come for a walk?” said Hermione to each of them, one by one. And they all said yes, feeling somehow like prisoners marshalled for exercise. Birkin only refused.
“Will you come for a walk, Rupert?”
“No, Hermione.”
“But are you sure?”
“Quite sure.” There was a second’s hesitation.
“And why not?” sang Hermione’s question. It made her blood run sharp, to be thwarted in even so trifling a matter. She intended them all to walk with her in the park.
“Because I don’t like trooping off in a gang,” he said.
Her voice rumbled in her throat for a moment. Then she said, with a curious stray calm:
“Then we’ll leave a little boy behind, if he’s sulky.”