here and there, as she went, her grey body was like a ghoSt. Anna, watching, threw scraps of bread, and she felt the child flame within her. She seemed to remember again forgotten, burning, far-off things.

“Where was I born, mother?” she asked.

“In London.”

“And was my father” — she spoke of him as if he were merely a strange name: she could never connect herself with him — ”was he dark?”

“He had dark-brown hair and dark eyes and a fresh colouring.

He went bald, rather bald, when he was quite young,” replied her mother, also as if telling a tale which was just old imagination.

“Was he good-looking?”