“There was one name he often called and repeated.”
Lady Ingleby’s heart stood still.
“Yes?” she said, hardly breathing.
“It was ‘Peter’,” continued Jim Airth. “The night before he was killed, he kept turning in his sleep and saying: ‘Peter! Hullo, little Peter! Come here!’ I thought perhaps he had a little son named Peter.”
“He had no son,” said Lady Ingleby, controlling her voice with effort. “Peter was a dog of which he was very fond. Was that the only name he spoke?”
“The only one I ever heard,” replied Jim Airth.
Then suddenly Lady Ingleby clasped both hands round his arm.
“Jim,” she whispered, brokenly, “Not once have you spoken my name. It was a bargain. We were to be old and intimate friends. I seem to have been calling you ‘Jim’ all my life! But you have not yet called me ‘Myra,’ Let me hear it now, please.”
Jim Airth laid his big hand over both of hers.
“I can’t,” he said. “Hush! I can’t. Not up here—it means too much. Wait until we get back to earth again. Then—Oh, I say! Can’t you help?”