THE SHADOWY THIRD
forgetting it, and darting through to change his boots in the evening would envelop his head and shoulders ridiculously in the musty velvet folds. Funny how he could never accustom himself to the changes; the house as it had been was always in his mind, more present than the house as it was. He could never get used to the silence half-way up the stairs, where the grandfather clock used to be. Often he found himself half-way across the hall to see what was the matter with it; it had been a tiresome clock, more trouble than it was worth, with, a most reverberating tick. Pussy had put a bracket of china there in its place.
Because it was a chilly autumn evening they had lighted a fire in the drawing-room, the curtains were drawn; what an evening they would spend together after supper! An armchair had been pulled forward and a workbasket gaped beside it; he wondered what Pussy had been sewing. He stood in the hall, looking in through the open door, and remembered Her making baby-clothes by the fire and holding them up in her fingers for him to see. Sometimes he had
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