The Dangerous Years Read Online Free Page A

France grew from a smudge to a solid, and took shape in cliff, downside, beaches, and the approach to Calais Harbour.
    â€œI’ve not seen it for over eleven years,” said Mary sadly. She was realising that she was about to step ashore on the ground where her husband lay. Was something missing in her, she asked herself, that she had not been again to visit his grave in the well-tended cemetery? But the regularity of the tiny graves, the sameness of them, had filled her heart with a dreadful sense of futility that had almost made her cry out against God. She had not dared to go again.
    Joan took her arm, as they stood waiting at the gangway, amid the cries of porters, and the excitement of a party of skiers on their way to the Alps, young folk perilously encumbered with the tools of their pastime.
    â€œThis is your suggestion, darling,” said Joan. “So we’ve got to enjoy ourselves, or all the effort and money will be wasted.”
    Mary looked swiftly at her daughter, surprised by this touch of perceptiveness. It cheered her, and it also made her feel guilty at having given way to so gloomy a reminiscence, when the girl must surely be needing all her attention. She obeyed Joan’s gesture, which sent her first down the gangway. They found their reservations on the train, and sat down to luncheon, which began as soon as the train moved.
    The winter afternoon gradually faded over northern France, but a wind had sprung up, whistling round the carriages and clearing away the mist. Darkness beyond the windows was pinned by diamonds of light from farmhouses, and Amiens and Chantilly glittered in the night. Joan fell asleep, but Mary could not lose herself. She watched her daughter’s face, the handsome oval of her chin, touched with a petulance by sleep; the fair hair disordered by travel. “I wonder if she is too strong-minded for him?” she asked herself suddenly; and her thoughts turned to the husband, somewhere in the Pennines, his climbing-boots ringing on the rocks, his rucksack light with a mass of papers concerned with problems in physics, the by-product of Lord Rutherford’s research work at Cambridge.
    But Paris was approaching, and Joan was wakened by that apprehensiveness latent in all travellers’ minds. The two women tidied themselves, collected their luggage, and stood in the corridor watching the lights of the city. At the barrier of the platform in the Gare du Nord, they were instantly approached by two men, one in advance of the other.
    â€œI recognised you, Mrs. Winterbourne,” said a quiet voice, “we don’t need to re-introduce ourselves.” Mary shook hands with Dr. Batten, and presented her daughter, who towered above the stooping figure whom she could not see distinctly under the gloomy station lights. She was aware of a surprisingly small hand that gripped hersfirmly; and of a pair of sharp eyes that could not be dimmed even in that dismal setting.
    He said nothing to her, merely stood for a moment with her hand in his. Then he turned, and his companion, who had been lingering in the background, came forward. “My brother, Colonel Tom Batten,” said the doctor. Mary greeted the stranger, looking at him vaguely, for it was useless to try to register any impression in this gloom. Nor did she detect a trace of irony in the doctor’s voice. She noticed only that he out-topped his brother, being a head taller than the Amazonian Joan, who was struggling with him about the luggage.
    The doctor did the talking as he led the way to the car. The other three were shy, and the women tired.
    â€œWe’ve put you into an hotel only a stone’s-throw from home, Mrs. Winterbourne. Our flat is almost wholly a professional headquarters, and no place to invite you to stay in, as you will see. But you are dining with us to-night, if that is agreeable. You did meet my wife? There are two children now, a boy and a girl, both bilingual monsters,