He put on his waistcoat and his coat, and pushed a way through to the path again.

The last level rays of the sun touched the wood. “I won’t come with you,” he said; “better not.”

She looked at him wistfully before she turned. His dog was waiting so anxiously for him to go, and he seemed to have nothing whatever to say. Nothing left.

Connie went slowly home, realising the depth of the other thing in her. Another self was alive in her, burning molten and soft in her womb and bowels, and with this self she adored him. She adored him till her knees were weak as she walked. In her womb and bowels she was flowing and alive now and vulnerable, and helpless in adoration of him as the most naive woman.⁠—It feels like a child, she said to herself; it feels like a child in me.⁠—And so it did, as if her womb, that had always been shut, had opened and filled with new life, almost a burden, yet lovely.