Rachel slipped to her feet and stared about her. A hand caught at her arm and pulled her into the chair.
"You promised. You can't leave till you hear me."
She sank back.
"Give me five minutes. I'm unworthy of them. But I've found you and must talk now. I can't go across without telling you."
She looked up. Tears almost in his eyes. His voice grown low. He seemed to be whispering something that didn't belong to the sanity of the hotel lobby and the two large potted palms in the corner.
"I'm unclean. I've been looking for you to ask you to forgive me."
Hazlitt's hands crept over his knees.
"Oh, God, you must listen and forgive me."
This was a mad monkey uttering noises too unintelligible for even an attentive hat, dress, and pair of shoes to make anything of.
"Rachel, I love you. I don't know how to say it. There's something I've got to say. Because ... otherwise I can't love you. I can't love you with the thing unsaid."