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She slept that night from sheer weariness, but, waking in the early morning, she lay for hours, listening to the cheery pipings of the birds, and wondering what she should do with her life. For there was no one belonging to her in a truly intimate sense. She had no near ties. There was no one who really wanted her, except–The burning colour rushed up to her temples. No; even he did not want her now. And again the loneliness and the emptiness seemed more than she could bear.

Dressing, she told herself suddenly and passionately that her home-coming had been a miserable farce, a sham, and a delusion. And she called bitterly to mind words that she had once either read or heard: “Where the heart is, there is home.”

The scent of honeysuckle and stale tobacco was mingled with that of fried bacon as she opened the door of the inn-parlour. It rushed out to greet her in a nauseating wave, and she nearly shut the door again in disgust. But the sight of an immense bunch of roses waiting for her on the table checked the impulse. She went forward into the room and picked it up, burying her face in its fragrance.

There was a tiny strip of paper twisted about one of the stalks which she did not at first perceive. When she did, she unfolded it, wondering. Four words met her eyes, written in minute characters, and it was as if a meteor had flamed suddenly across her sky. They were words that, curiously, had never ceased to ring in her brain since the moment she had first read them: “With love from Tots.”

* * * * *

Fully five minutes passed before Ruth crossed the room to the honeysuckle-draped window, the roses pressed against her thumping heart. Outside, an ancient wooden bench that sagged dubiously in the middle stood against a crumbling stone wall. It was a bench greatly favoured by aged labourers in the summer evenings, but this morning it had but one occupant–a loose-knit, lounging figure with a straw hat drawn well down over the eyes, and a pipe thrust between the teeth.

As Ruth gazed upon this negligent apparition, it suddenly moved, and the next instant it stood up in the sunshine and faced her, hat in one hand, pipe in the other.

“Mornin'” said Tots. “Got somethin’ nice for breakfast?” His brown face smiled imperturbably upon her. He looked pleased to see her, but not extravagantly so.

Ruth fell back a step from the window, her roses clutched fast against her. She was for the moment speechless.

Tots continued to smile sociably.

“Nice, quiet little place–this,” he said. “There’s a touch of the antediluvian about it that I like. Good idea of yours, comin’ here. No one to get in the way. It won’t be disturbin’ you if I sit on the window-sill while you have your breakfast?”

Ruth experienced a sudden, hysterical desire to laugh. He was beyond her, this man–utterly, hopelessly beyond her.

She sat down at the table, not with the idea of eating anything, but from a sense of sheer helplessness. Tots knocked the ashes from his pipe and took his seat on the window-sill. He did not seem to be aware of any strain in the situation.

After a pause, during which Ruth sat motionless, he turned a little to survey her.

“Not begun yet?” he queried.

She looked back at him with a species of desperate courage.

This sort of thing could not go on. She must be brave for once. Unconsciously she was still gripping the roses with both hands.

“Mr. Waring–” she began.

“Tots,” he substituted gently.

“Well–Tots,” she repeated unwillingly, “I–I want to ask you something.”

“Fire away!” said Tots.

“I want to know–I want to know–” She stumbled again, and broke off in distress.

Tots wheeled round as he sat, and brought his long legs into the room.