She bowed her head over the plate in her lap, crumbling a scone to fragments.
‘Why don’t you come too, Judith? Do! It’d be perfectly proper wouldn’t it, Mummie? We’re her bachelor uncles.’
It was precisely at those words, at the unexpected recalling of all that light-heartedness, that happiest day of all, that the thing leapt to life within her, and fiercely, horribly pressed towards birth. Oh, now there was no hope. Roddy had arisen all in a moment from his false burial.
With a vast effort she prevented her eyes from closing quite; but to speak was impossible.
‘Roddy says——’ began Martin, glanced across at her, and stopped uncertainly, startled. He was silent, and then said:
‘A bit—after my journey—it’s so hot to travel. Isn’t it?’ She turned to his mother.
‘Yes, my dear, it is,’ she said cooingly. ‘Come, I’ll take you to your room and you shall rest till dinner.’
Martin had got up and was hovering over her, anxious and despondent. But she could smile at him now, and she said:
‘I’d rather go out if I may, and get cool. The garden looks so lovely.’