like to-day, and, when I got home, I was fanciful and frightened: the wind seemed to me so gigantic and I . . . I was so small. . . . Then you came home . . . and I was so frightened . . . I crept into your arms . . . I looked into your eyes, Addie. . . . In those days, it was very strange, they changed colour, they turned grey. . . . Now they are sometimes quite dark-grey, but sometimes I see a gleam of blue in them. I used to feel so sorry . . . that they changed colour. . . . Do you remember? It was not long before Uncle Gerrit died. . . . Oh, how frightened I felt . . . for days and weeks before! . . ."
"And why are you thinking of those days, Mammy darling?"
"I don't know why. Perhaps only because it's blowing. . . . How small our country is by the sea! . . . It's always blowing, always blowing. . . . One would think that everything that happens is blown to us, across the sea, and comes down upon us, in heavy showers of rain. . . ."
He smiled.
"Oh, my boy, sometimes I feel so terribly heavy-hearted, without knowing why! . . ."
"Is it the house?"
"The house? No, no, it's not the house."
"Don't you like the house even now?"
"Oh, yes . . . I'm pretty used to the house!"
"Is it the wind, the rain?"
"Perhaps both. . . . But haven't I known them for years?"
"Then what is it that makes you heavy-hearted?"
"I don't know."
"Come here, to me. . . ."
"Where, my boy?"
"On my knees, in my arms. . . ."
She sat down on his knees and smiled, sadly:
