The hour that Propert usually stayed had to-day lengthened itself out (so short was it) to two before the young man looked at his watch, and jumped up from his chair.
TWO:The conversation was cut short by the call to dinner, a call that has suppressed many a touch of sentiment before now, on land as well as on the water.
THREE:Swiftly and jubilantly he crossed the road: at the sight of that lit blind all the awakening pangs of his heart had passed from him, even as at the sight of the nodding daffodils had passed the apathy that encompassed it before. His intolerance of his wife, the dreaminess of his purposeless existence ceased to be: on the other hand his secret garden, now that the gardener who had made it sacred was waiting for him, bloomed again in an everlasting spring. In answer to his ring, which he heard faintly tinkling inside, there came steps on the stairs, and the dark fan-light over the door leaped into brightness, as some one turned on the switch. Then the door opened, and, as he had expected, there was Charles.
