As Hal slipped out, he left the door open and nodded. “She’ll see you.”
Pushing aside the tapestry curtain of Absalom, he entered. A breeze was ruffling the curtains. Against the wall outside ivy whispered. The evening glow, pouring across tree-tops, gilded the faded gold of the harp and filled the room with an amber vagueness.
She was sitting up in bed, propped on pillows, with a blue shawl wrapped about her shoulders. She looked such a tiny Desire—such a girl. Her bronze-black hair was braided in a plait and fell in a long coil across the bedclothes. Their eyes met. He halted.
Slowly her face broke into a smile. “I wonder which of us has been the worse.”
He knelt at her side, pressing her hand.
“Which is it, Meester Deek? D’you remember their names? It’s Miss Independence. I wouldn’t kiss it if I were you; it’s an unkind, a scratchy little hand.”
He raised his eyes. “Are you very much hurt?”
She gazed down at him mockingly. “By the accident or by your letter?—By the accident, no. By your letter, yes. I do feel things deeply—I was feeling them more than ordinarily deeply just then. I didn’t like you when you wrote that.”
“But I wrote you so often. I told you how sorry I was. You never answered.”
She crouched her chin against her shoulder. “Shall I tell you the absolute truth? It’s silly of me to give away my secrets; a girl ought always to be a mystery.” Her finger went up to her mouth and her eyes twinkled. “It was because I knew that I was coming to England. I wanted to see how patient you—— You understand?”