They flew to Canterbury, and turned, banking in a steep curve, to shoot back over the way they had come. They were five thousand feet up, and the wind was ferocious; it seemed to press the breath back down their throats, to wrench at the flesh on their faces. Much Dorothea cared! On that homeward flight she was allowed, for the first time, to guide the aeroplane herself. Denis kept his hands ready to resume control, in case of a slip, but he was not needed; she held the pillar till the time came to switch off the engine and glide in a long, long slant towards the landing ground. B-rr, the motor purred again, as the monoplane cocked up her tail, like a bird, to "flatten out" before alighting. The landing wheels took off the shock, and they ran smoothly over the grass till the momentum was exhausted.
Denis stayed at the hangars to see the machine housed. When he came back to the house he found his pupil waiting for him on the steps of the porch. She had taken off her helmet and her leather coat, and wore the same rough tweeds in which she had wandered about the woods of the Semois. Her skirt was short enough to show a pair of neat brown ankles, as well as the brown shoes below them, and her hair hung down her back in a yard and a quarter of pigtail. She said she couldn't coil it under the helmet. Her eyes were sparkling, and her cheeks were pink, and she propped herself against the white pillar, first on one foot, then on the other, with the long-legged, supple awkwardness of a schoolgirl. Strange how the years had fallen away, how little mark had been left by her marriage, even by motherhood!
"I did it all right, didn't I?" she demanded, naïvely eager. "I didn't make any bad breaks?"
"Not a break!" Denis assured her.
"Really? Truly? Will you let me do a figure of eight next time? I know I could!"
"We'll see when next time comes."
Dorothea looked exceedingly naughty, like Geraldine caught stealing the cream—the simile was Denis's own. "It's coming again to-morrow!" she announced daringly.
Denis shook his head, smiling at her. "No, it's not."
"Ah, do let me! I've wasted so much time with the weather, and then this hateful hand, and I do so want to learn—I can't wait till Saturday!"
"I'm sorry to disappoint such ardor, but I'm afraid you must."