He listened to the rain for a long time, but when he spoke it was to answer her last words.—“It’s been since then with me, too.”
Alix’s head lay against his shoulder and he held both her hands in his against his breast; and he was seeing the little French girl, the strange, ominous little French girl, sitting in the Victoria waiting-room with her straight black brows and her eyes calm over their fear. He was seeing the lovely dancing head bound with crystal, aware of him, looking for him even in her joy; he was seeing the Alix who had come from Toppie. “We’ve always been so near, from the first, haven’t we?” he said.
“So near, Giles. That was what troubled me, though I did not understand, when Jerry asked me to marry him.—You were so much nearer than Jerry.”
“And who did you think I should believe it to be, darling, when I saw the letter to Jerry?—Didn’t you know I’d have to ask you some time? Did you really believe, when we were so near as that, you could hide it from me?”
“I thought I could. I had to stop Jerry from coming. I could have pretended that there was someone you didn’t know.—Someone who might not love me, but whom I should always love.”
“You who promised never to tell me a lie!”
“But for those things women must always lie, Giles.”
She raised her head now to look at him. Her face was radiant yet grave. “There will never be anything to hide any more;—never—never.—There is nothing you do not understand. You understand all my life. You understand Maman.—Giles, how happy this will make her.”
“I hope it will. But I came to plead Jerry’s cause, you know. She thinks I’m pleading it now.”
“How happy it will make her that you did not have to plead it.”