“No, let me have it.”

“Well, then, I’ll read it for you.”

“No, you can have it after.”

“Edna,” he whispered.

“Oh, please don’t,” she pleaded.“Not here the people.”

Why did he want to touch her so much and why did she mind?Whenever he was with her he wanted to hold her hand or take her arm when they walked together, or lean against her not hard just lean lightly so that his shoulder should touch her shoulder and she wouldn't even have that.All the time that he was away from her he was hungry, he craved the nearness of her.There seemed to be comfort and warmth breathing from Edna that he needed to keep him calm.Yes, that was it.He couldn't get calm with her because she wouldn't let him touch her.But she loved him.He knew that.Why did she feel so curiously about it?Every time he tried to or even asked for her hand she shrank back and looked at him with pleading frightened eyes as though he wanted to hurt her.They could say anything to each other.And there wasn’t any question of their belonging to each other.And yet he couldn’t touch her.Why, he couldn’t even help her off with her coat.Her voice dropped into his thoughts.

“Henry!”He leaned to listen, setting his lips.“I want to explain something to you.I will I will I promise after the concert.”

“All right.”He was still hurt.

“You’re not sad, are you?” he said.

He shook his head.

“Yes, you are, Henry.”

“No, really not.”He looked at the roses lying in her hands.

“Well, are you happy?”

“Yes.Here comes the orchestra.”

It was twilight when they came out of the hall.A blue net of light hung over the streets and houses, and pink clouds floated in a pale sky.As they walked away from the hall Henry felt they were very little and alone.For the first time since he had known Edna his heart was heavy.

“Henry!”She stopped suddenly and stared at him.“Henry, I'm not coming to the station with you.Don't don't wait for me.Please,please leave me.”

“My God!” cried Henry, and started, “what's the matter Edna darling Edna, what have I done?”

“Oh, nothing go away,” and she turned and ran across the street into a square and leaned up against the square railings and hid her face in her hands.

“Edna Edna my little love you’re crying.Edna, my baby girl!”

She leaned her arms along the railings and sobbed distractedly.

“Edna stop it's all my fault.I'm a fool I'm a thundering idiot.I've spoiled your afternoon.I've tortured you with my idiotic mad bloody clumsiness.That's it.Isn't it, Edna?For God’s sake.”

“Oh,” she sobbed, “I do hate hurting you so.Every time you ask me to let let you hold my hand or or kiss me I could kill myself for not doing it for not letting you.I don't know why I don't even.”She said wildly.“It's not that I'm frightened of you it's not that it's only a feeling, Henry, that I can't understand myself even.Give me your handkerchief, darling.”He pulled it from his pocket.“All through the concert I've been haunted by this, and every time we meet I know it's bound to come up.Somehow I feel if once we did that you know held each other’s hands and kissed it would be all changed and I feel we wouldn’t be free like we are we’d be doing something secret.

We wouldn’t be children any more…silly, isn’t it?I'd feel awkward with you, Henry, and I'd feel shy, and I do so feel that just because you and I are you and I, we don't need that sort of thing.”She turned and looked at him, pressing her hands to her cheeks in the way he knew so well, and behind her as in a dream he saw the sky and half a white moon and the trees of the square wwith their unbroken buds.He kept twisting, twisting up in his hands the concert programme.“Henry!You do understand me don’t you?”

“Yes, I think I do.But you’re not going to be frightened any more, are you?”He tried to smile.“We'll forget, Edna.I'll never mention it again.We'll burythe bogy in this square now you and I won’t we?”

“But,” she said, searching his face “will it make you love me less?”

“Oh, no,” he said.“Nothing could nothing on earth could do that.”

London became their playground.On Saturday afternoons they explored.They found their own shops where they bought cigarettes and sweets for Edna and their own tea shop with their own table their own streets and one night when Edna was supposed to be at a lecture at the Polytechnic they found their own village.It was the name that made them go there.“There’s white geese in that name,” said Henry, telling it to Edna.“And a river and little low houses with old men sitting outside them old sea captains with wooden legs winding up their watches, and there are little shops with lamps in the windows.”

It was too late for them to see the geese or the old men, but the river was there and the houses and even the shops with lamps.In one a woman sat working a sewing machine on the counter.They heard the whirring hum and they saw her big shadow filling the shop.“Too full for a single customer,” said Henry.“It is a perfect place.”

The houses were small and covered with creepers and ivy.Some of them had worn wooden steps leading up to the doors.You had to go down a little flight of steps to enter some of the others; and just across the road to be seen from every window was the river, with a walk beside it and some high poplar trees.

“This is the place for us to live in,” said Henry.“There's a house to let, too.I wonder if it would wait if we asked it.I’m sureit would.”

“Yes, I would like to live there,” said Edna.

They crossed the road and she leaned against the trunk of a tree and looked up at the empty house, with a dreamy smile.

“There is a little garden at the back, dear,” said Henry, “a lawn with one tree on it and some daisy bushes round the wall.At night the stars shine in the tree like tiny candles.And inside there are two rooms downstairs and a big room with folding doors upstairs and above that an attic.And there are eight stairs to the kitchen very dark, Edna.You are rather frightened of them, you know.‘Henry, dear, would you mind bringing the lamp?I just want to make sure that Euphemia has raked out the fire before we go to bed.’”

“Yes,” said Edna.“Our bedroom is at the very top that room with the two square windows.When it is quiet we can hear the river flowing and the sound of the poplar trees far, far away, rustling and flowing in our dreams, darling.”

“You’re not cold are you?” he said, suddenly.

“No no, only happy.”

“The room with thefolding doors is yours.”Henry laughed.“It's a mixture it isn't a room at all.It's full of your toys and there's a big blue chair in it where you sit curled up in front of the fire with the flames in your curls because though we're married you refuse to put your hair up and only tuck it inside your coat for the church service.And there's a rug on the floor for me to lie on, because I'm so lazy.Euphemia that's our servant only comes in the day.After she's gone we go down to the kitchen and sit on the table and eat an apple, or perhaps we make some tea, just for the sake of hearing the kettle sing.That’s not joking.If you listen to a kettle right through it’s like an early morning in Spring.”

“Yes, I know,”she said.“All the different kinds of birds.”

A little cat came through the railings of the empty house and into the road.Edna called it and bent down and held out her hands “Kitty! Kitty!The little cat ranto her and rubbed against her knees.

“If we're going for a walk just take the cat and put it inside the front door,” said Henry, still pretending.“I’ve got thekey.”

They walked across the road and Edna stood stroking the cat in her arms while Henry went up the steps and pretended to open the door.

He came down again quickly.“Let’s go away at once.It’s going to turn into a dream.”

The night was dark and warm.They did not want to go home.“What I feel so certain of is,” said Henry, “that we ought to be living there, now.We oughtn't to wait for things.What's age?You're as old as you'll ever be and so am I.You know,” he said, “I have a feeling often and often that it's dangerous to wait for things that if you wait for things they only go further and further away.”

“But, Henry, money!You see we haven’t any money.”

“Oh, well, perhaps if I disguised myself as an old man we could get a job as caretakers in some large house that would be rather fun.I'd make up a terrific history of the house if anyone came to look over it and you could dress up and be the ghost moaning and wringing your hands in the deserted picture gallery, to frighten them off.Don't you ever feel that money is more or less accidental that if one really wants things it’s either there or it doesn’t matter?”

She did not answer that she looked up at the sky and said, “Oh dear, I don’t want to go home.”

“Exactly that's the whole trouble and we oughtn't to go home.We ought to be going back to the house and find an odd saucer to give the cat the dregs of the milk jug in.I'm not really laughing I'm not even happy.I'm lonely for you, Edna I would give anything to lie down and cry” and he added limply, “with my head in your lap and your darling cheek in my hair.”

“But, Henry,” she said, coming closer, “you have faith, haven’t you?I mean you are absolutely certain that we shall have a house like that and everything we want aren’t you?”

“Not enough that's not enough.I want to be sitting on those very stairs and taking off these very boots this very minute.Don't you?Is faith enough for you?”

“If only we weren’t so young” she said miserably.“And yet,” she sighed, “I’m sure I don’t feel very young I feel twenty at least.”

Henry lay on his back in the little wood.When he moved the dead leaves rustled beneath him, and above his head the new leaves quivered like fountains of green water steeped in sunlight.Somewhere out of sight Edna was gathering primroses.He had been so full of dreams that morning that he could not keep pace with her delight in the flowers.“Yes, love, you go and come back for me.I’m too lazy.”She had thrown off her hat and knelt down beside him, and by and by her voice and her footsteps had grown fainter.

Now the wood was silent except for the leaves, but he knew that she was not far away and he moved so that the tips of his fingers touched her pink jacket.Ever since waking he had felt so strangely that he was not really awake at all, but just dreaming.The time before, Edna was a dream and now he and she were dreaming together and somewhere in some dark place another dream waited for him.“No, that can’t be true because I can’t ever imagine the world without us.I feel that we two together mean something that’s got to be there just as naturally as trees or birds or clouds.”

He tried to remember what it had felt like without Edna, but he could not get back to those days.They were hidden by her; Edna, with the marigold hair and strange, dreamy smile filled him up to the brim.He breathed her; he ate and drank her.He walked about with a shining ring of Edna keeping the world away or touching whatever it lighted on with its own beauty.“Long after you have stopped laughing,” he told her, “I can hear your laugh running up and down my veins and yet are we a dream?”

And suddenly he saw himself and Edna as two very small children walking through the streets, looking through windows, buying things and playing with them, talking to each other, smiling he saw even their gestures and the way they stood, so often, quite still, face to face and then he rolled over and pressed his face in the leaves faint with longing.He wanted to kiss Edna, and to put his arms round her and press her to him and feel her cheek hot against his kiss and kiss her until he’d no breath left and so stifle the dream.

“No, I can't go on being hungry like this,” said Henry, and jumped up and began to run in the direction she had gone.She had wandered a long way.Down in a green hollow he saw her kneeling, and when she saw him she waved and said “Oh, Henry such beauties!I’ve never seen such beauties.Come and look.”

By the time he had reached her he would have cut off his hand rather than spoil her happiness.How strange Edna was that day!All the time she talked to Henry her eyes laughed; they were sweet and mocking.Two little spots of colour like strawberries glowed on her cheeks and “I wish I could feel tired,” she kept saying.“I want to walk over the whole world until I die.Henry come along.Walk faster Henry!If I start flying suddenly, you’ll promise to catch hold of my feet, won’t you Otherwise I’ll never come down.”And “Oh,” she cried, “I am so happy.I’m so frightfully happy!”They came to a weird place, covered with heather.It was early afternoon and the sun streamed down upon the purple.

“Let’s rest here a little,” said Edna, and she waded into the heather and lay down.

“Oh, Henry, it’s so lovely.I can’t see anythingexcept the little bells and the sky.”

Henry knelt down by herand took some primroses out of her basket and made a long chain to go round her throat.“I could almost fall asleep,” said Edna.She crept over to his knees and lay hidden in her hair just beside him.

“It’s like being under the sea, isn’t it, dearest, so sweet and so still?”

“Yes,” said Henry, in a strange husky voice.

“Now I’ll make you one of violets.”But Edna sat up.“Let’s go in,” she said.

They came back tothe road and walked a long way.Edna said, “No, I couldn't walk over the world I'm tired now.”She trailed on the grass edge of the road.“You and I are tired, Henry!How much further is it?”

“I don't know notvery far,” said Henry, peering into the distance.Then they walked insilence.

“Oh,” she said at last, “it really is too far, Henry, I'm tired and I'm hungry.Carry my silly basket of primroses.”He took them without looking at her.

At last they came to a village and a cottage with a notice “Teas Provided.”

“This is the place,” said Henry.“I've often been here.You sit on the little bench and I'll go and order the tea.”She sat down on the bench, in the pretty garden all white and yellow with spring flowers.A woman came to the door and leaned against it watching them eat.Henry was very nice to her, but Edna did not say a word.“You haven’t been here for a long spell,” said the wman.

“No the garden’s looking wonderful.”

“Fair,” said she.“Is the young lady your sister?”Henry nodded Yes, and took some jam.

“There's a likeness,” said the woman.She came down into the garden and picked a head of white jonquils and handed it to Edna.“I suppose you don’t happen to know anyone who wants a cottage,” said she.“My sister’s taken ill and she left me hers.I want tolet it.”

“For a long time?” asked Henry, politely.

“Oh,” said the woman vaguely, “that depends.”

Said Henry, “Well I might know of somebody could we go and look at it?”

“Yes, it's just a step down the road, the little one with the apple trees in front I'll fetch you the key.”

While she was away Henry turned to Edna and said, “Will you come?”She nodded.

They walked down the road and in through the gate and up the grassy path between the pink and white trees.It was a tiny place two rooms downstairs and two rooms upstairs.Edna leaned out of the top window, and Henry stood at the doorway.“Do you like it?” he asked.

“Yes,” she called, and then made a place for him at the window.“Come and look.It’sso sweet.”

He came and leant out of the window.Below them were the apple trees tossing in a faint wind that blew a long piece of Edna's hair across his eyes.They did not move.It was evening the pale green sky was sprinkled with stars.“Look!” she said “stars, Henry.”

“There will be a moon in two T’s,” said Henry.

Shedid not seem to move and yet she was leaning against Henry's shoulder; he put his arm round her “Are all those trees down there apple?” she asked in a shaky voice.

“No, darling,” said Henry.“Some of them are full of angels and some of them are full of sugar almonds but evening light is awfully deceptive.She sighed.“Henry we mustn’t stay here any longer.”

He let her go and she stood up in the dusky room and touched her hair.“What has been the matter with you all day?”she said and then did not wait for an answer but ran to him and put her arms round his neck, and pressed his head into the hollow of her shoulder.“Oh,” she breathed, “I do love you.Hold me, Henry.”He put his arms round her,and she leaned against him and looked into his eyes.

“Hasn’t it been terrible, all today?” said Edna.“I knew what was the matter and I've tried every way I could to tell you that I wanted you to kiss me that I’d quite got over the feeling.”

“You’re perfect, perfect, perfect,” said Henry.

“The thing is,” said Henry, “how am I going to wait until evening?”He took his watch out of his pocket, went into the cottage and popped it into a china jar on the mantelpiece.He'd looked at it seven times in one hour, and now he couldn't remember what time it was.Well, he'd look once again.Half past four.Her train arrived at seven.He’d have to start for the station at half past six.Two hours more to wait.

He went through the cottage again downstairs and upstairs.“It looks lovely,” he said.He went into the garden and picked a round bunch of white pinks and put them in a vase on the little table by Edna's bed.“I don’t believe this,” thought Henry.“I don't believe this for a minute.It's too much.She'll be here in two hours and we'll walk home, and then I'll take that white jug off the kitchen table and go across to Mrs. Biddie's and get the milk, and then come back, and when I come back she'll have lighted the lamp in the kitchen and I’ll look through the window and see her moving about in the pool of lamplight.And then we shall have supper, and after supper (Bags I washing up!)

I shall put some wood on the fire and we'll sit on the hearth rug and watch it burning.There won't be a sound except the wood and perhaps the wind will creep round the house once… And then we shall change our candles and she will go up first with her shadow on the wall beside her, and she will call out, Good night, Henry and I shall answer Good night, Edna.And then I shall dash upstairs and jump into bed and watch the tiny bar of light from her room brush my door, and the moment it disappears will shut my eyes and sleep until morning.Then we’ll have all tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow night.Is she thinking all this, too?Edna, come quickly!”

Had I two little wings,

And were a little feathery bird,

To you I’d fly, my dear

“No, no, dearest…Because the waiting is a sort of Heaven, too, darling.If you can understand that.Did you ever know a cottage could stand on tip toe.This one is doing it now.”

He was downstairs and sat on the doorstep with his hands clasped round his knees.That night when they found the village and Edna said, “Haven't you faith, Henry?”“I hadn’t then.Now I have,” he said, “I feel just like God.”

He leaned his head against the lintel.He could hardly keep his eyes open, not that he was sleepy, but for some reason and a long time passed.

Henry thought he saw a big white moth flying down the road.It perched on the gate.No, it wasn't a moth.It was a little girl in a pinafore.What a nice little girl, and he smiled in his sleep, and she smiled, too, and turned in her toes as she walked.“But she can’t be living here,” thought Henry.“Because this is ours.Here she comes.”

When she was quite close to him she took her hand from under her pinafore and gave him a telegram and smiled and went away.There's a funny present! thought Henry, staring at it.“Perhaps it's only a make believe one, and it's got one of those snakes inside it that fly up at you.”He laughed gently in the dream and opened it very carefully.“It’s just a folded paper.”He took it out and spread it open.

The garden became full of shadows they span a web of darkness over the cottage and the trees and Henry and the telegram.But Henry did not move.