She gathered up the trailing skirt and glanced down at it, well pleased. "It is rather nice, isn't it?"
"Fine! You look as pretty as a picture this evening, Nellie. I tell you, I thought so, when I squinted in through the window."
"That's because I'm so happy."
"So am I." He pressed her arm to show why, and "Maurice! you are a goose," was her gay comment; but for once his foolish loverlikeness pleased her; her mood was widely charitable.
They paced the little lawn in silence. She suddenly asked, "You don't mind my being happy, do you?"
"Mind! Good Lord!" and he pressed her arm again.
"Being excited about—about it, I mean. It's natural, Maurice?"
"Of course it is. Of course it is, old girl."
"But you're not—it doesn't excite you?"
Mr. Letham was too honest, even at risk of disturbing this happy passage, to pretend the untrue. "Well, that's nothing," he said. "That's nothing. I'm so beastly slow. An earthquake wouldn't excite me."