“I liked him,” Wint said. “I can’t help it, even now. He was my friend.”
“I believe they will come out all right. I feel it.”
Wint laughed at her gently. “Intuition?”
“Yes. You men call it a hunch.”
Silence again, for a while. They came to her house. Wint thought the simple place was beautiful in the moonlight; he wanted, desperately, to go in. But there was a curious diffidence upon him, and he stopped at the gate till she said:
“Come. It’s not cold, to-night. We can sit on the porch.”
“You want me?”
“Yes, Wint.” Her eyes said more than her words. He opened the gate, and they went up the walk to the house sedately enough, side by side. Any one might have seen.
The moonlight did not fall upon the porch. There was a shadowed place there. When they came into this shadow, Joan stopped, and looked at Wint. Her eyes were very dark. Something was pounding in his throat, so that he could not speak. He put out one hand, in an uncertain, fumbling way. Joan looked down at his hand, and smiled a little, and put her hand in his.
They stood thus for a little, hand in hand, facing each other. Wint said huskily, at last: