Page:The return of the soldier (IA returnofsoldier00west2).pdf/168

This page has been validated.
154
THE RETURN OF THE SOLDIER

"I used to have nice hair," she mourned, "but these last few years I've let myself go." She made half-hearted attempts to smooth the straggling tendrils on her temples, but presently laid down her brush and clicked her tongue against her teeth. "I hope that man's not worrying Chris," she said.

There was no reassurance ready, so I went to the other side of the room to put her hat down on a chair, and stayed for a moment to pat its plumes and wonder if nothing could be done with it. But it was, as surgeons say, an inoperable case. So I just gloomed at it and wished I had not let this doctor interpose his plumpness between Chris and Margaret, who since that afternoon seemed to me as not only a woman whom it was good to love, but, a patron saint must appear to a Catholic, as an intercessory being whose kindliness could be daunted only by some