“I am glad,” she answered. “No one has ever wanted my help before.”
“I want it,” he said.
“Just now,—because you are unhappy. But it won’t always be like that.”
“It will,” he insisted. “I shall always want you. You are necessary to me. You make life bearable.”
“I don’t think it very likely that I shall be with you much longer,” she said.
“Why?” he asked quickly.
She shook her head, and gave him one of her sphinx-like smiles.
“I can’t explain,” she replied. “But I think it will be as I say.”
“You don’t want to leave us?” he asked.
She hesitated, and looked straight ahead along the hot white road. The expression of her face was difficult to read; the man, watching it closely, learned nothing from it. He was conscious only of the sudden hardening of the lines about her mouth.