"Marjie," he said, "to—why, to think you'd come! Why—why, little
Marjie!"
"I—oh, Charley-boy, I—"
"What, little one? What?"
"I—I dun'no'."
"What is it, hon? Ain't you as glad as I am?"
"I dun'no', only I—I—I'm scared, Charley—scared, I guess."
"Why, you just never was so safe, Marjie, as now—you just never was!"
She could not meet the eloquence of his eyes, but his smile was so near that the tightness at her throat seemed suddenly to thaw.
"Charley-boy," she said.
But at the sound of returning footsteps she sprang backward, clasping her hands behind her. A copper-haired woman with a copper-haired child in the curve of her arm moved through the lighted front room and toward them. Her smile was upturned, with a dimple low in one cheek, like a star in the cradle of a crescent moon. Charley Scully turned his vivid face toward her.