Her emotion had quieted, and her eyes mused. “I really think he’s only a child at heart,” she said. “But sometimes he frightens me suddenly....” King sat down beside her on the step, so handsome and protecting; he took her fingers and caressed them. “You’ve no idea how still it gets after you’ve gone away to the fields,” she sighed.
“Tomorrow,” he said, “if you like I’ll take you a part of the way so you can see the Ainu scraping opium—it’s quite a sight.” She brightened. “And one of these days,” he went on, “we must make a little excursion up to the grave of Vander Hagen, the martyr Utopian—take our lunch along, picnic style—and be thankful we didn’t get carried off on the back of an ideal!”
Somehow, as he laughed in his light, careless way, she remembered how Elsa had accused her once of having ideals. It set her musing a bit. Then she found herself remembering, too, how glibly her husband had spoken, long ago, about whistling up the sun, sitting astride the pyramids. Now would he whistle on the grave of the man who had come here with a dream and broken his heart...?
“How long has it been,” King asked, “since the Star of Troy left us?”
“Six weeks, Ferd.”
“Sure we haven’t skipped a month or two somehow?”
“I cross off each day on the calendar,” Stella said, much more cheerful now the tears were spent. “Come in and I’ll show you. I make quite a business of it!”
She took his hand and led him in. It was a little cooler than outside; the mats at the windows made it quite dusky; here and there on the walls a scrawny spider slept.
They stood together before the calendar: two leaves gone—in a few days another; then in thirty days....
It was time that must be annihilated. Time—time—time....