Stephen Michael Hilary Byrne had given his mother the maximum of trouble that Friday evening; and on Sunday morning she was still too feeble and ill to appreciate his beauty. Old Dr. Browning was less cheerful than Stephen had ever seen him. He shook his head almost grimly as he squeezed his square frame into his diminutive car.
Stephen went back disconsolately into the warm garden. He had seen Margery for a moment, and she had whispered weakly, “You go out in your boat, my dear,” and then something about “a lovely morning … I’m all right.” Also he had seen his son and tried hard to imagine that he was two years old, a legitimate object for enthusiasm. He had helped Joan to feed her rabbits and swept the garden and tidied things in the summerhouse. But he had done all these things with an anxious eye on the full and falling river. And already he had had several shocks.