She kissed him, whispered: "Yes, dear, but you mustn't say anything."
Winchie went back to his place. The conversation was wholly between the two men, the subject being, of course, chemistry. After supper Courtney pleaded a headache and, having uttered the formulas prescribed for the parting and having heard from him the formulas embodying his part in such an exchange, withdrew. Instead of being agitated, she was in truth as calm as she seemed outwardly—and numb. She saw Winchie to bed, occupied herself mechanically for an hour, then sat at one of the windows of her front room looking out toward the lake. When she thought at all, it was of trifles; most of the time, during those two hours of waiting, she did not think, but listened to the beating of her blood as it made the ringing in the ears that climaxes the oppression of an intense silence.
At length Richard came up. He glanced in at her. "How's the headache?" he inquired, laying a caressing hand on her shoulder.
She moved; his hand fell away. "No better," replied she. "Good night."
"You'll feel all right in the morning," he said. He kissed her crown of hair and departed toward his own rooms—those that had been Basil's.
She heard him stirring about, first in his study just across the hall, then in his bedroom. Half an hour, and she went on the balcony, to the corner of the house, to see if his lights still showed. All his windows were dark. She returned, listened at his door. No sound. She stole down the stairs, unlatched the lake-front door, went out. She strolled across the lawn, in full view—for the moon was rising. At the edge of the shadows made by the bushes round the summer house, she halted.
"Basil!" she called softly.
He came from the summer house and stood before her. "It's safer to stay here," she said. "We can watch the house."
He made no protest. He took her hands, drew her to his breast. Never before had he touched her without feeling the glow and surge of passion; now he had no sense of her physical beauty, of her physical charm, only sense of the being he loved.
"Forgive me the horrible things I said, Courtney," he murmured. "It wasn't I that was speaking. It was the beginnings of what I was fast becoming."