“He’ll stay here?” he asked.

“Yes! He hates to travel as he is.”

“Ay, poor devil!” he said, with sympathy.

There was a pause.

“You won’t forget me when I’m gone, will you?” she asked. Again he lifted his eyes and looked full at her.

“Forget?” he said. “You know nobody forgets. It’s not a question of memory.”

She wanted to say: “What then?” but she didn’t. Instead, she said in a mute kind of voice: “I told Clifford I might have a child.”

Now he really looked at her, intense and searching.

“You did?” he said at last. “And what did he say?”

“Oh, he wouldn’t mind. He’d be glad, really, so long as it seemed to be his.” She dared not look up at him.