“But it isn’t that. I wouldn’t accept any more. It’s the dear old ones that I want—the ones you sent me almost the minute you landed.”
He glanced round sharply; a few doors off he saw a florist’s. “Don’t go back,” he pleaded. And then, with a frankness which he feared might offend her: “If you did go back, we might meet other people. I want you all to myself to-day; I can’t spare a second of you to other persons. Promise to stop here for me.”
“But I—perhaps I don’t want to lose a second of you to other persons.” She rested her hand on his arm lightly. “Where are you going?”
“Be back before you can say Jack Robinson.”
He darted off. As he entered the shop, he caught her slow smile of intelligence forbidding him.
While the flowers were being arranged, he kept his eyes turned to where she hovered on the pavement; the anxiety that she might escape him was not quite gone. He saw her hail a taxi. For a moment he thought—— But, no, she was having an earnest conversation.
“It’s all arranged, brother. We’re going to drive down
“Don’t tell me.” He banged the door and settled himself beside her. “Life’s much more surprising when you don’t know where you’re going.” He laid the flowers in her lap. “For you. You won’t refuse them?”
She bent over them curiously, as though she hadn’t the least idea what he had been purchasing. As she stripped the paper from them and the white cup of the blossoms began to appear, she frowned severely.
“Lilies of the valley! You’re too good. You spoil me. And now you’ll think that I was asking for them. No. I won’t wear them.”