“Not a line!” said a passionate, vibrating voice.
The voice so startled and thrilled Edwin that he almost jumped, as he looked round. To Edwin it was dramatic; it was even dangerous and threatening. He had never heard a quiet voice so charged with intense emotion. Hilda Lessways had come back to the room, and she stood near the door, her face gleaming in the dusk. She stood like an Amazonian defender of the aged poet. Edwin asked himself, “Can any one be so excited as that about a book?” The eyes, lips, and nostrils were a revelation to him. He could feel his heart beating. But the girl strongly repelled him. Nobody else appeared to be conscious that anything singular had occurred. Jimmie and Johnnie sidled out of the room.
“Oh! Indeed!” Charlie directed his candid and yet faintly ironic smile upon Hilda Lessways. “Don’t you think that some of it’s dullish, Teddy?”
Edwin blushed. “Well, ye–es,” he answered, honestly judicial.
“Mrs Orgreave wants to know when you’re coming to supper,” said Hilda, and left.
Tom was relocking the bookcase.