for him to consider. When he heard them like that he usually rushed into the hall, demanding hotly, "Well, what is it now?"
"What is what?"
"You know I can't work when you come downstairs like that.'
"Like what?"
"As though you were worrying."
"Well, why didn't you take a house where I could slide down the banisters?"
This time the feet came down so slowly he felt sure she wanted him to rush out. The rushing out always put him in the wrong. Well, he just wouldn't. He would stay where he was, that would show her he was indignant. He took out page 38, put in a blank sheet and rattled the keys vigorously. But he felt cheated of a sensation. He always enjoyed bursting out, through the door at the foot of the stairs, and catching her transfixed on the landing, with the big windows behind her—half frightened, half angry. He would not have told her so, but it was partly because she was so pretty there: the outline of her comely defiant head against the light, her smooth arm emerging from the dainty sleeve that caught and held a pearly brightness. How lovely she is, he thought; it's gruesome for her to be so pretty
