III + 

Their life together, thought Barry, would be a keen, jolly, adventuring business, an ardent thing, full of gallant dreams and endeavours. It should never grow tame or stale or placid, never lose its fine edge. There would be mountain peak beyond mountain peak to scale together. They would be co-workers, playmates, friends and lovers all at once, and they would walk in liberty as in a bourgeois dream. + 

So planned Barry Briscoe, the romantic, about whose head the vision splendid always hovered, a realisable, capturable thing. + 

Gerda thought, “I’m happy. Poetry and drawing and Barry. I’ve everything I want, except a St. Bernard pup, and Kay’s giving me that for Christmas. I’m happy.” + 

It was a tingling, intense, sensuous feeling, like stretching warm before a good fire, or lying in fragrant thymy woods in June, in the old Junes when suns were hot. Life was a song and a dream and a summer morning. + 

“You’re happy, Gerda,” Neville said to her once, gladly but half wistfully, and she nodded, with her small gleaming smile. + 

“Go on being happy,” Neville told her, and Gerda did not know that she had nearly added “for it’s cost rather a lot, your happiness.” Gerda seldom cared how much things had cost; she did not waste thought on such matters. She was happy. + 