At La France Quadrant, when the unloaded vans had driven off with the men asprawl and joking inside, Joanna was able at last to shut the door upon staring humanity which had all day been so interested in her and her belongings. It was a relief.

She sat down on a packing-case in the still crowded hall. The new electric wiring had not yet been connected, and in the dusk of the spring evening the round stone pillars on either side of her might have been tree-trunks. The confused shadows from the laburnum outside were thrown on the glass panel and fanlight of the front door. She listened intently. The house was utterly still, and from outside she could hear no sound but the faint, determined rushing of the stream far down where it passed by the flint mill. She was cut off now from the rest of the world, remote and alone, waiting in a dense forest: and she felt a little afraid.

But once she had left the hall, going to the back of the house she began to be busy as a bird is busy with its nest. Already in one of the rooms each piece of furniture was in its place, the windows were curtained, and even some rugs had been unrolled upon the bare floor. Now Joanna fetched fuel from the kitchen, for the evening was cool, almost frosty, and when the fire had burned up she drew the curtains and began to unpack by candlelight.

For the last forty-eight hours she had been planning for this. Every least thing had been thought of beforehand. She was of those who ever desire material fitness and she had discovered the same desire in Louis also. It was one of the many bonds between their natures. In a suit-case she had put together the few family possessions which had seemed to her worthy of her lover’s eye, and it did not take her long to dispose these. The result was far enough from the perfect beauty she longed for, but as she looked round upon her work she had a strong feeling of pleasure. In the flickering light of fire and candles it was a room prepared for the beloved and therefore lovely. For the first time Joanna was alive to the clear sincerity of design in the high silver candlesticks which had been a presentation to Horatio Bannerman from the St. Jude’s congregation on the twenty-fifth anniversary of his ministry – and the foreign shawl, spread as a coverlet upon the wide mahogany couch gave a glamour.

Then putting on her hat, and fingering the latch-key in her pocket to be quite sure she had it safe, she went out to the shops.