"C-come again s-s-some t-time," stammered Father Vassall.
"Thanks, I will, Father. Good-bye."
"G-g-good-bye."
He balanced himself as the horse started forward, and then turned and waved. The little priest waved too. They swung round the turn.
Paul looked at the clouds, moving serenely across the sky. He peered into the bare twigs of an oak. Some palm was in bloom, soft, yellow, feathery.
"Truth, it's real mild spring, sir," said Tim.
"Yes," said Paul. "I must say I'm glad summer is coming."
"London, single," he said through the wicket at the booking office. It was real, that funny little window, and odd, how absurd the man looked, peering at him! A couple of turns up the platform, a good asphalted platform, with staring advertisements, rather jolly—about pens, Easter in Normandy, Nestle's Milk. And there was the train at last, swinging merrily round the corner, noisy, fussy, real.
Third class, smoker, empty, that would do. Paul flung himself into a far corner. "Thank God," he said to himself, "thank God."
A tall dark girl walked up the train. She looked in at Paul's window. He didn't see her, but she saw him, hesitated a moment, and decided, after all, she wouldn't travel to town with him. If perhaps, the next compartment was empty, she would prefer that. It was. She got in and shut the door. She had a newspaper and a novel to read, but she settled herself to stare out of the window instead. The country was so unimaginably lovely.