"I remember," he answered, looking squarely into her eyes, "I remember nothing—only that I have been to blame for everything. I told you once—long ago—that I understood. And I understand now, old girl, understand as I never did before. I fancy we both have been living according to a wrong notion of things. We started right when we were first married, but I worked away from it somehow and pulled you along with me. But we've both been through a great big change, honey, a great big change, and we're starting all over again.... Well, there's the carriage, I guess."
They rose, gathering up their valises.
"Hoh!" said Jadwin. "No servants now, Laura, to carry our things down for us and open the door, and it's a hack, old girl, instead of the victoria or coupe."
"What if it is?" she cried. "What do 'things,' servants, money, and all amount to now?"
As Jadwin laid his hand upon the knob of the front door, he all at once put down his valise and put his arm about his wife. She caught him about the neck and looked deep into his eyes a long moment. And then, without speaking, they kissed each other.
In the outer vestibule, he raised the umbrella and held it over her head.
"Hold it a minute, will you, Laura?" he said.
He gave it into her hand and swung the door of the house shut behind him. The noise woke a hollow echo throughout all the series of empty, denuded rooms. Jadwin slipped the key in his pocket.
"Come," he said.
They stepped out from the vestibule. It was already dark. The rain was falling in gentle slants through the odorous, cool air. Across the street in the park the first leaves were beginning to fall; the lake lapped and washed quietly against the stone embankments and a belated bicyclist stole past across the asphalt, with the silent flitting of a bat, his lamp throwing a fan of orange-coloured haze into the mist of rain.