“Formerly. But now it is always spoken of as Tumbridge Wells. At this Tumbridge Wells, Christina Alberta, there are hills with names that point directly to some connection with the ancient Israelites, Mount Ephraim and Mount Gilboa and so on, and there are a number of curiously shaped rocks, shaped in the likeness of great toads and prehistoric monsters and mystical forms and nobody knows whether they are the work of God’s hand or man’s. I am very anxious to see these things for myself. They may have a deeper and closer significance for us than is commonly supposed. There are plenty of Boarding Houses at Tumbridge Wells—I was told only the other day by a man I met in the Assyrian room in the British Museum—and some of them are said to be very comfortable and reasonable indeed.”
“We might go there for the holidays,” said Christina Alberta, “before the London session begins.”
Outside was the summer afterglow, and a dusky peace filled the room. Father and daughter followed divergent trains of thought. Mr. Preemby was the first to break the silence.
“Now that I shall be in mourning, or half mourning, for some time I have decided to give away all those Harris tweed knickerbocker suits and stockings of mine. Some poor man might feel the comfort of them—in winter. I have never really liked those very baggy knickerbockers, but of course while your poor dear mother was alive her taste was Law to me. And those caps; they get over your eyes when you’re hot. That tweed stuff.... It is overrated. When you ride a bicycle or anything it ravels out with the friction of the seat. Makes you look ridiculous.... And I think that quite soon I shall get myself one of those soft grey felt hats—with a black band.”
“I have always wanted to see you wear one, Daddy,” said Christina Alberta.
“It would count as mourning?”
“Oh! yes, Daddy.”
Mr. Preemby meditated pleasantly. The girl had common sense. Her advice was worth having. “As for putting the swastika on your poor dear mother’s tombstone, perhaps you are right in thinking it is not what she herself would have chosen. It may be better after all to do as you suggest and erect a simple cross. After all—it is her tombstone.”
Whereupon Christina Alberta got up from her chair and went round the table—almost at a prance, until she remembered things—and kissed him. For some obscure reason she hated the swastika almost as much as she loved her Daddy. For her it had become the symbol of silliness, and she did not like to think of him as silly. Particularly now when for some obscure reason she was beginning to think of him as ill-used.