"I never heard such a thing!" declared Doris. "Jeff, surely you are not going to allow that!"
Jeff came from the window. "Of course you must join us, Granny," he said.
But Granny Grimshaw was obdurate on that point. "My place is in the kitchen," she said firmly. "And there I must bide. But I am ready to show you the way to your room, my dear, whenever you want to go."
Doris bent forward impulsively and kissed her. "You are much, much too kind to me, you and Jeff," she said.
But as soon as she was alone with Jeff her shyness returned. She could not feel as much at ease with him in the house as in the open air. She did not admit it even to herself, but deep in her heart she had begun to be a little afraid.
Till then she had gone blindly forward, taking in desperation the only course that seemed to offer her escape from a position that had become wholly intolerable. But now for the first time misgivings arose within her. She remembered how slight was her knowledge of the man to whom she had thus impetuously entrusted her future; and, remembering, something of her ready confidence went from her. She fell silent also.
"You are not eating anything," said Jeff. She started at his voice and looked up.
"No, I'm not hungry," she said. "I shall eat all the more presently when we get out into the open."
He said no more, but finished his own breakfast with businesslike promptitude.