"I—I mean—I mean nothing. I don't know what I am saying. I've been working too hard, and I have got dazed and stupid."
He turned to look at the blaze on the waters to the west.
"Ah, how beautiful it is!" he exclaimed. "I wish I were a landscape-painter. But you are more beautiful, Margery. But it is safer to be a landscape-painter, so much safer!"
Margery stopped and faced him.
"Now, Frank, tell me the truth. Have you been out since I left you yesterday morning?"
"No."
"How long have you been working each day?"
"I don't know. I didn't look at my watch. All day, I suppose; and the days are long—terribly long—and the nights too. The nights are even longer, but one can't work then."
Margery was frightened, and, being frightened, she got angry with herself and him.
"Oh, you really are too annoying," she said, with a stamp of her foot. "You get yourself into bad health by overworking and not taking any exercise—you've got the family liver, you know—and then you tell me the house is full of ghosts, and conjure up all sorts of absurd fancies about losing your personality, frightening yourself and me. Frank, it's too bad!"