"To-morrow—perhaps I'll come to you," he said, his voice hushed and strained. "But you mustn't stay here. You've come on impulse——"
"Where her reputation's concerned a woman never acts on impulse. You might not come to-morrow. It must be to-night." Her voice was as strange as his had been, was so low that its distinctness seemed weird and ghostly. "Come, Horace, drop your silly melodramatics—for it's you that are acting melodrama. Can't you see, can't you feel, that I am indeed your friend?"
He seated himself and reflected, she watching him. The stillness had the static terror of a room where a soul is about to leave or about to enter the world. It was not her words and her manner that had moved him, direct and convincing though they were; it was the far subtler revelation of her inmost self, and, through that, of a whole vast area of human nature which he had not believed to exist. Suddenly, with a look in his eyes which had never been there before, he reached out and took her hand. "You don't know what this means to me," he said in a slow, quiet voice. And he released her hand and went to lean his forehead against the tall shelf of the chimney-piece, his face hidden from her.
She did not interrupt his thoughts and his emotions until he was lighting a fresh cigarette at the table. Then she said, "Now, tell me—won't you, please?"
"It's a long story," he began.
"Don't try to make it short," urged she. And she settled herself comfortably.
It took him an hour to tell it; they discussed it for an hour and a half afterwards. Whenever he became uneasy about the time, she quieted him by questions or comments that made him feel her interest and forget the clock. At the last quarter before two, he rose determinedly. "I'm going to put you into a cab," said he. "You have accomplished all you came for—and more—a great deal more."
She made no attempt to stay on longer. He helped her into her cloak, helped her to adjust the scarf so that it would conceal her face. They were both hysterically happy, laughing much at little or nothing. He rang for the elevator, then they dashed down the stairs and escaped into the street before the car could ascend and descend again. At the corner where there was a cab stand, he drew her into the deep shadow of the entrance to the church, took both her hands between his. "It will be a very different fight from the one I was planning when you came," said he.
"And you'll win," asserted she confidently.
"Yes, I'll win. At least, I'll not lose—thanks to you, Neva." He laughed quietly. "When I'm old, I'll be able to tell how once the sun shone at midnight and summer burst out of the icy heart of January."