Some note of urgency in his voice made her smile waver. It disappeared altogether as she gazed at him.
"Of course," she answered, slowly, "I am sure;" and then, after a little pause and with a slight but a noticeable hesitation, she added: "Why do you ask?"
Dorman Royle crossed over to her side and most unwisely told her:
"Because at midnight the gate into the paddock was opened and swung to without any hand to touch it. I had been thinking of you, Ina--wanting you--and I wondered."
He spoke half in jest, but there was no jesting reply. For a little while, indeed, Ina did not answer him at all. He was standing just a step behind her as she sat at the table in the window, so that he could not see her face. But her body stiffened.
"It must have been a delusion," she said, and he walked forward and sat down in a chair by the table facing her.
"If so, it was a delusion which the dog shared."
She did not change her attitude; she did not stir. From head to foot she sat as though carved in stone. Nor did her face tell him anything. It became a mask; it seemed to him that she forced all expression out of it, by some miracle of self-command. But her eyes shone more than usually big, more than usually luminous; and they held their secret too, if they had a secret to hold. Then she leaned forward and touched his sleeve.
"Tell me!" she said, and she had trouble to find her voice; and, having found it, she could not keep it steady.
"I am sorry, Ina," he said. "You are frightened. I should not have said a word."