“Oh! about⁠—a long time ago⁠—I wanted her to take me again, but she wouldn’t. You and Daddy never go to church, do you?”

“No, we don’t.”

“Why don’t you?”

His mother smiled.

“Well, dear, we both of us went when we were little. Perhaps we went when we were too little.”

“I see,” said little Jon, “it’s dangerous.”

“You shall judge for yourself about all those things as you grow up.”

Little Jon replied in a calculating manner:

“I don’t want to grow up, much. I don’t want to go to school.” A sudden overwhelming desire to say something more, to say what he really felt, turned him red. “I⁠—I want to stay with you, and be your lover, Mum.”

Then with an instinct to improve the situation, he added quickly “I don’t want to go to bed tonight, either. I’m simply tired of going to bed, every night.”

“Have you had any more nightmares?”

“Only about one. May I leave the door open into your room tonight, Mum?”

“Yes, just a little.” Little Jon heaved a sigh of satisfaction.

“What did you see in Glensofantrim?”

“Nothing but beauty, darling.”

“What exactly is beauty?”

“What exactly is⁠—Oh! Jon, that’s a poser.”

“Can I see it, for instance?” His mother got up, and sat beside him.