She could not feel him look at her. At length, he spoke, quietly. "I've some news for you, or possible news. It has very much to do with your happiness. Tell me, if it were in my power to give you back your eyes, would you tell me to do that?"
"My eyes? What do you mean? To see again?"
"If I gave you back your sight, I would be giving you back the truth; and that would be very, very cruel."
He saw the fluttering of her throat, the twitching of the hands in her lap, and so hurried on.
"Listen! There's a chance in a hundred that your sight can be restored. My old preceptor writes me, from what I've told him, that there is about that chance. If it did succeed——"
"Then I'd see again!"
"Yes. So you would be very unhappy."
"You say a thing like that!"
He winced, flushed.
"You come here now with hopes that you ought not to offer, and you qualify even that! Fine—fine! You think I can stand much more than I have?"