“I don’t expect you to understand, of course. But I really ought to go. And I am going.”
“Very well,” said Helen stiffly, in her turn.
“I have a—something to write, you see,” explained Bayard.
“You don’t call it a sermon any more, do you? Heresy writes a ‘something.’ How delicious! Do go and write it, by all means. I hope the Unforgiven will appreciate it.”
“You are not a dull woman,” observed Bayard uncomfortably. “You don’t for an instant suppose I want to go?”
Helen raised her thick, white eyelids slowly; a narrow, guarded light shone underneath them. She only answered that she supposed nothing about it.
“If I stay,” suggested Bayard, with a wavering look, “will you sing The Serenade to me—all over again?”
“Not one bar of it!” replied Helen promptly.
“You are the wiser of us two,” said Bayard after a pause.