Again he looked up at her, smiling. "But how I have alarmed you!" he said regretfully. "And your arm, petite? It is not burnt—not at all?"
He took her hand gently, and put back the tattered sleeve to satisfy himself on this point.
Chris said nothing. Her lips had begun to tremble. But she winced a little when he touched a place inside her arm where the flame had scorched her.
He glanced up sharply. "Ah! that hurts you, that?"
"No," she said, "no. It is nothing." And then, with sudden passion: "Bertie, what does a little scorch like that matter when you—when you—" She broke off, fighting with herself, and pointed a shaking finger at his wrist.
It had been blistered by the flame, and his shirt-cuff was charred; but the injury was slight, remarkably so in consideration of the utter recklessness he had displayed.
He snapped his fingers with easy indifference. "Ah, bah! It is a bagatelle, that. In one week it will be gone. And now—why, chérie—"
He stopped abruptly. She had dropped upon her knees beside him, her hands upon his shoulders, her face, tragic in its pain, upturned to his.
"Bertie, why do you try to hide things from me? Do you think I am quite blind? You are ill. I know you are ill. What is it, dear? Won't you tell me?"
He made a quick gesture as if he would check either her words or her touch, and then suddenly he stiffened. For in that instant there ran between them once again, vital, electric, unquenchable, that Flame that had kindled long ago on a morning of perfect summer, that Flame which once kindled burns on for ever.