"I'm afraid you're busy and I'm keeping you."
"No. I'm not busy—not specially. You're not keeping me."
If Jerome Stuart went before she had mastered the situation, it would forever hold its whip over her.
Jean sat down but Jerome stood where he was. This reversal of position brought him nearer, so that now he was close, looking down upon her.
"The Adirondacks must be lovely now."
"They are."
"You're back earlier than you intended, aren't you?"
"Yes."
Jean was smiling up at him.
Had Jerome Stuart always looked like that, or was it some quality the had brought back from the open? His gray eyes glowed with the same light that heralded dawn. His body radiated a spiritual fire which, Jean felt, would consume any obstruction upon which he chose to direct it. It was the Galahad quality she had imagined in Herrick, made manifest; the courage she had overestimated in Gregory, raised to the limit of human possibility. Jean began to tremble.