East.  It’s a curious thing.  One feels it in the blood.  It’s six years—­more—­since I climbed on to the shelf, and I’ve been quite smug and self-satisfied most of the time.  There’s been a twinge of regret every now and then, but nothing I couldn’t whistle away.  But now—­” his words quickened; he spoke them whimsically, yet passionately, in her ear—­“between you and me, I’d give an eye, an ear, or a leg—­anything I possess in duplicate—­to come off the shelf, and have one more fling.  I’m stiff!  I’m stiff!  And, ye gods, I’m only four-and-thirty!  I always thought I’d go till sixty at least.  I entered Parliament just to keep going; but that’s only a steady progress downhill—­a sort of frog’s march in which you kick and are kicked, but don’t do much besides.  I’m a fighter, kiddie.  I wasn’t made to ornament the shelf.  I’m not a hero; only an ordinary, restless, discontented mortal.  They told me this afternoon that it was time I did something, that I was dropping out, that I should ossify if I sat still much longer. (A good term that; worthy of our friend Max!) And, by Heaven, they’re right!  But how can I help it?  I know in my heart of hearts that it would be sheer brutality to spring this on Muriel now.”

He ceased to speak, and there fell a silence.  Olga’s arms clasped him very tightly.  Her cheek pressed his forehead.  It was not often that Nick opened his heart to her thus.  Only twice before had it ever happened, and on each occasion he had been in trouble—­once when the woman he loved had sent back his engagement ring through her, and once again nearly two years later when that same woman—­Muriel, his wife—­had lain at death’s door all through one dreadful night while they two, close pals, had waited huddled together in the passage outside her room.  Those two occasions were sacred to Olga, never spoken of to any, shrined deep in the most inner, most secret recesses of her heart.  Nick’s confidence had ever been her most cherished possession.  It thrilled her now with something more than pride; and through her silence her sympathy came out to him in a flood of understanding which needed no verbal expression.

She spoke at last very softly, almost in a whisper.  “Nick, you know, don’t you, that you are dearer to me than anyone else in the world?”

He put up his hand and patted her cheek.  “What!  Still?” he said.

“Still, Nick?  What do you mean?”

“Nothing at all,” said Nick promptly.  “Go on!”

She took his hand and held it.  “Nick darling, do you remember how I came and kept house for you—­years ago, at Redlands, when I was a child?”

“Rather!” said Nick.  “Bully, wasn’t it?”

She hesitated a little.  “Nick, I’m going to make a perfectly awful suggestion.”

“Don’t mind me!” said Nick.

She laughed faintly.  “I don’t, dear,—­formidable as you can be.  It only flashed into my mind that if Muriel feels she really can’t leave Reggie, and if she can possibly bear to part with you and you with her, could you possibly put up with me as a substitute for those few months and take me instead, if Dad could spare me?”