The room was warm and clean, the curtains drawn, the two table lamps - hers and the one by the empty chair opposite. On the behind her, two tall glasses, soda water, whisky. Fresh ice In the Thermos' bucket.

Mary Maloney was waiting for her husband to come home from work.

Now and again she would up at the clock, but without , merely to please herself with the thought that each minute gone by made it nearer the time when he would come. There was a slow smiling air about her, and about everything she did. The drop of the head as she bent over her was curiously . Her skin - for this was her sixth month with child - had acquired a wonderful quality, the mouth was soft, and the eyes, with their new placid look, seemed larger, darker than before.

When the clock said ten minutes to five, she began to listen, and a few moments later, punctually as always she heard the on the gravel outside, and the car door , the foot-steps passing the window, the key turning in the . She laid aside her sewing, stood up, and went forward to kiss him as he came in.

'Hullo, darling,' she said.

'Hullo,' he answered.

She took his coat and hung it in the closet. Then she walked over and made the drinks, a one for him, a weak one for herself; and soon she was back again in her chair with the sewing, and he in the other, opposite, holding the glass with both his hands, it so the ice cubes against the side.