“I am so sorry. Yes; I might have remembered that. How shall I earn forgiveness?”
“By telling me exactly what you were thinking about, absolutely and without reservations. On no other conditions, mind.”
“Oh, only what a nuisance it is being called away just now.”
The tone was meant to be offhand, but the quick ear of Nidia was not so easy to deceive. When John Ames did look down into the bright laughing face it had taken an expression of sympathy, that with a quick bound of the heart he read for one that was almost tender.
“Yes. It is horrid!” she agreed. “You had a long time to run yet, hadn’t you?”
“Nearly a month.”
“I call it perfectly abominable. Can’t you tell them it is absolutely impossible to come back just now, that—er—in short, on no account can you?”
He looked at her. “Do you wish it?” was on his lips; but he left the words unsaid. He shook his head sadly.
“I’m afraid it can’t be done. You see, I am entirely at their beck and call. And then, from what they say, I believe they really do want me.”
“Yes; I was forgetting that. It is something, after all, to be of some use, as I was telling you the other night; do you remember?”