been better than this; that she should have gone with that—­that person.  Yet thus it is.  And they’ll all set on her and speak against her, and I shall have to bear it.  You and I will have to bear it together, Thomas....  I suppose I ought to be angry.  I ought to want to go after them, to the end of the world or wherever they’ve gone and kill him and bring her back.  But I can’t.  I should fail in that too.  I’m tired of trying to do things; simply horribly tired of it, Thomas.”  He sat down on the rug with Thomas in his arms; and there, an hour later, Peggy found them.  She swung in breezily, crying, “Oh, Peter, all alone in the dark?  Where’s Rhoda?  Why, the silly children haven’t had their tea!” she added, looking at the unused cups on the tea-table.

Peter looked up vaguely.  “Oh, tea.  I forgot.  I don’t think I want any tea to-day.  And Thomas has had his.  And Rhoda’s gone.  It’s no good not telling you—­is it?—­because you’ll find out.  She’s gone away.  It’s been my fault entirely; I didn’t make her happy, you see.  And she’s written out a list of the times Thomas has to feed at.  I suppose Mrs. Adams will do that if I ask her, and generally look after him when I’m out.”

Peggy stood aghast before him for a moment, staring, then collapsed, breathless, on the sofa, crying, with even more r’s than usual.

“Peter!...  Why, she’s gone and rrun off with that toad, that rreptile man!  Oh, I know it, so it’s not a bit of use your trying to keep it from me.”

“Very well,” said Peter; “I suppose it’s not.”

“Oh, the little fool, the little, silly, wicked fool!  But if ever a little fool got her rich deserts without needing to wait for purgatory, that one’ll be Rhoda....  Oh, Peter, be more excited and angry!  Why aren’t you stamping up and down and vowing vengeance, instead of sitting on the hearth saying, ‘Rhoda’s gone,’ as if it was the kitten?”

“I’m sorry, Peggy.”  Peter sighed a little.  “I’m nursing Thomas, you see.”

Peggy at that was on her knees on the floor, taking both of them into her large embrace.

“Oh, you two poor little darling boys, what’s to become of you both?  That child has a heart of stone, to leave you to yourselves the way she’s done.  Don’t defend her, Peter; I won’t hear a word said for her again as long as I live; she deserves Guy Vyvian, and I couldn’t say a worse word for her than that.  You poor little Tommy; come to me then, babykins.  You must come back to us now, Peter, and I’ll look after you both.”

She cuddled Thomas to her breast with one arm, and put the other round Peter’s shoulders as he sat huddled up, his chin resting on his knees.  At the moment it was difficult to say which of the two looked the most forsaken, the most left to himself.  Only Thomas hadn’t yet learnt to laugh, and Peter had.  He laughed now, softly and not happily.

“It has been rather a ghastly fiasco, hasn’t it,” he said.  “Absurd, you know, too, in a way.  I thought it was all working out so nicely, Thomas coming and everything.  But no.  It wasn’t working out nicely at all.  Things don’t as a rule, do they?”