It was the first time Lilian had spoken, and Claverton, who was sitting opposite her and almost as silent, heard with a thrill that low, sweet voice which had haunted his dreams and his waking thoughts during the long years of solitude. He had been furtively watching her, noting every turn of the beautifully poised head, striving to catch a glance from the sweet, serious eyes, which somehow were never suffered to meet his. And he likewise noted that Lilian Strange at twenty-seven was, if possible, even more lovely and winning to behold than on that day just four years ago, when he had first gazed upon the vision which had completely altered the course of his life. Not even the most spiteful of critics could say of her that she had “gone off.” A trifle graver perhaps, but it was a gravity that suited well her soft, dark beauty; and the smile, when it did come, lit up the serene, exquisite face as the ripple of a sunbeam on a sleeping pool. And it was just such a smile as this which caused a tug of pain at Claverton’s heart, when the urchin uttered his bellicose aspiration.
“By the time you’re big enough for that, sonny, there may be occasion for it, not before,” said Payne, as he wheeled back his chair. “Come and have a smoke on the stoep, Claverton. What! Did you say, ‘No’?”
“That’s what I said.”
“Well! Here’s a transformation! Why, you haven’t given up the only sociable habit—Ah, I see. Ladies, you may score a triumph; you have tamed this savage. He is going to give up the soothing weed in favour of your more soothing society. But I am not, therefore for the present—so long,” and with a laugh the light-hearted fellow went out, cramming his pipe as he went.
“Now, Mr Claverton, we shall expect you to tell us some most thrilling adventures,” said his hostess. “You must have a great stock of them.”
“I assure you I have none,” he began.
“Oh, that won’t do. But tell me the ins and outs of that affair when you first met George.”
Claverton started. His wits were, in popular phraseology, wool-gathering; and at first he thought of to-day’s row. Then he remembered.
“That affair at De Klerk? It wasn’t much of a thing. Payne was holding his own gallantly against four big Dutchmen, and I came up in time to turn the scale. You said something about his life just now, but his life wasn’t in danger; the most they’d have done would have been to have given him rather a mauling.”
“What was it about?” asked Lilian.