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“Maury Kebble’s brother?”

“Yes,” she said, rather surprised to think of him having known Maury Kebble. Still there was nothing strange about it. “Well, he and I were talking about sweetness a few weeks ago. Oh, I don’t know—I said that a man named Howard—that a man I knew was sweet, and he didn’t agree with me, and we began talking about what sweetness in a man was. He kept telling me I meant a sort of soppy softness, but I knew I didn’t—yet I didn’t know exactly how to put it. I see now. I meant just the opposite. I suppose real sweetness is a sort of hardness—and strength.”

Kieth nodded.

“I see what you mean. I’ve known old priests who had it.”

“I’m talking about young men,” she said, rather defiantly.

“Oh!”

They had reached the now deserted baseball diamond and, pointing her to a wooden bench, he sprawled full length on the grass.

“Are these young men happy here, Kieth?”

“Don’t they look happy, Lois?”

“I suppose so, but those young ones, those two we just passed—have they—are they——”