"It's a Pierrot play, isn't it?"
"Yes, I was wondering if the veritable commedia del arte can't have been something like that."
"Why very probably."
While he talked Fanshaw was furtively watching James Turnstable's thin pink and white face. The boy was eating toast and staring at Nan with worshipping blue eyes. At length when she turned to him and said: "More tea, Jamesy," he grew red to the ears and stammered, "Please, Cousin Nancibel." An attractive kid, Fanshaw was thinking. O, the cycle of it.
"There'll be lots of room ... We'll all go back to Boston together in my car," Mrs. Turnstable was saying. "Don't you love Marblehead, Mr. Macdougan?"
* * * *
Fanshaw's mother sat by the library window looking out into the garden that was full of the fiery chalices of Darwin tulips.
"Once I'm well, Fanshaw, we must rebuild the garden. There aren't any paeonies. I've always wanted some of those beautiful yellow paeonies in the garden. You must get me some next time you see them in a flower shop."
"I will, indeed, Mother," said Fanshaw from the easy chair where he was reading.
"What are you reading, dear?"