And you'll never
be real anywhere else."
Howard applauded solemnly.
"I'll make a poem of that--one day, when I'm awfully drunk, and don't
know what I'm doing."
But Robert sat up sharply, frowning at her, white, almost accusing.
"When did you live in Italy, Francey?"
"Last year--all last year."
"You mean--you chucked your work--everything--just to play round----?"
Howard yawned prodigiously.
"You don't get our Francey's point of view, Stonehouse. You don't
understand."
"Just to play round," she echoed to herself. Then she laughed and
unclasped her hands from about her knees and stood up effortlessly,
stretching out her arms like a sleepy child. "And now I'm going to
gather sticks for a fire and primroses to take home. Coming Robert?"
"No," he muttered.
Howard rolled over in the grass.
"Sulky young idiot--if I wasn't half asleep--or I'd been asked----"
His voice died into an unintelligible murmur.
So she went alone. The rest, heavy with food and sunshine, nibbled
jadedly at the remnants of the feast, exchanging broken, drowsy
comments. Perhaps Gertie Sumners was brooding over the three kings
with their golden crowns. But Robert knelt and watched Francey run
down the hill-side, faster and faster, like a brown shadow. There was
a thick belt of beech trees at the bottom, and she ran into them and
was lost.
He rose stiffly. He did not want the others to see--he did not want to
know himself, that he was following her.
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