"Oh, I remember the doves!" cried Louise suddenly, forgetting her wretchedness.
He looked at her wistfully and solemnly. "Some people say the doves have the sweetest song of all. There's a very plaintive note—you remember?"
"Yes," she whispered thickly, avoiding his eyes.
The breath of Fate seemed faintly to animate her having remembered the little Mexican doves. "I think," he said, "they have the saddest song of any of the birds."
5
A remark, dreadful yet tantalizing in the vistas it opened up, was overheard by the Rev. Needham as he was coming out on to the screened porch. It was a remark which set on foot an increasingly turbulent desire to know, unequivocally and without expurgation, just what had been the nature of his sister-in-law's life on the distracting island of Tahulamaji.
Mrs. Needham had retired to the kitchen for a final fling with Eliza about breakfast, leaving the minister alone in the living room with his daughter. Miss Whitcom and Mr. Barry had passed out on to the porch, and Louise had dropped down in a nice shadowy corner with a book—just as young ladies naturally and invariably do after dinner, when the light is beginning to fail, and their lover is waiting for them outside.
The Rev. Needham, whose suspicions had already been rather alarmingly roused, now felt sure not all was well. Why should Louise behave like this if all were well? And even Barry—Barry wasn't, of course, one of those romantic fellows who would always be sighing and rolling their eyes; but there were subtler manifestations.... They had gone walking together in the afternoon—thank God! There was that much to cling to. Yes, thank heaven they had done that much anyway!
But the Rev. Needham was so full of perplexity that he hardly knew what to do next. He told himself, in desperation, that everything must, in reality, be all right—rather much as his daughter had assured herself on the train that all must work out for the best: her best. He knew, as a matter of fact, that this was not quite honest persuasion. But it helped. Oh, it was a very present help. To tell the truth, it sufficed to carry him quickly out of his daughter's presence. In his heart, the minister knew that the issue ought to be faced at once. Yes, he ought to call Louise over on to his knee, just as in the old days, before any of the unhappy love troubles began, and ask her to tell him what had gone wrong. But he didn't call her over. Instead he began humming in a perfectly unconcerned manner, and strolled outside.