caressingly she seized his head and beat it against the cushions.
She gave Bob a month’s notice the next day.
II
At the end of June they slipped away to Sydney, passing through Auckland without seeing anyone but Valerie’s father, and they returned at the end of August in the same secretive manner.
Valerie was delighted with Sydney, delighted with Dane’s friends, and meeting for the first time in her life a friendly community of artists, found it the thing she had dreamed about, the world in which she wanted to shine. But there was a fly in the honey. The dining and wining were not good for Dane. And there were two occasions on which he disappeared for the best part of three days.
So that by the time they returned to settle down to life together at the old mission house she knew well he had chosen the better half of wisdom when he had left the life of cities behind him. And she was by no means sorry herself to have the prospect of work and peace ahead of her there for a while. She was content to leave a remoter future to take care of itself.
They had discussed on the voyage home what they would do to the house to make it a proper custodian of the rights of two such individualistic beings as they were. The first thing they agreed on was that unless one of them felt an overwhelming urge, which was not to be encouraged, they should not meet till lunch time. Dane did a good deal of his work at night and often slept late. Valerie was very anxious that his ways should not be interfered with, and he was as anxious as she that parts of his
