He held the pencil up, as if he were offering it by auction.
Nell hesitated, then she held out her hand without a word. He dropped the battered pencil case into it, and his bantering tone changed instantly.
"Thank you!" he said gravely, earnestly. "I—I was afraid that you were going to refuse, and—well, that would have hurt me. And that would have hurt you; for I know how gentle-hearted you are, Miss Nell."
Her hand closed over the pencil case tightly until the silver grew warm, then she slipped the thing into her pocket.
"Please observe," he said, after a pause, during which he lit a cigarette, "that I am not in need of any token as a reminder. I am not likely to forget—Shorne Mills."
He turned on his elbow and gazed at the jetty and the cottages which straggled up from it in the narrow ravine to the heights above, to the unique and quaint village upon which the still hot sun was shining as the boat danced toward it.
"No. I shan't find it difficult to remember—or regret."
He stifled a sigh. A sigh rose to her lips also, but she checked it, and forced a smile.
"One does not break one's arm every day, and it is not easy to forget that," she said; "and yet, I dare say you will remember Shorne Mills. I don't think you will see many prettier places. Isn't it quite lovely this evening, with the sun shining on the cliffs and making old Brownie's windows glitter—like—like the diamonds in mamma's bracelet?"
She laughed with a girlish mischievousness, and ran on rapidly, as if she must talk, as if a pause were to be averted as a peril.