She withdrew a pace and leaned against the side of the window, letting her eyes rest upon him with a little, bitter smile. For the moment she had less care of herself and of him than she had ever had before.
"Ah!" she said, "then you keep me here because you love me?"
"Bertha!" he exclaimed.
Even his equable triviality found a disturbing element in the situation.
"Richard," she said, "go and finish your cigarette out of doors. It will be better for both of us. This has gone far enough."
"It has gone too far," he answered, nervously. "It is deucedly uncomfortable, and it isn't our way to be uncomfortable. Can't we make it smooth again? Of course we can. It would not be like you to be implacable. I am afraid I was a trifle irritable. The fact is, I have had a great deal of business anxiety lately,—one or two investments have turned out poorly,—and it has weighed on my mind. If the money were mine, you know; but it is yours"—
"I have never wished you to feel the difference," she said.
"No," he replied. "Nothing could have been nicer than your way about it. You might have made me very uncomfortable, if you had been a hard, business-like creature; but, instead of that, you have been charming."
"I am glad of that," she said, and she smiled gently as he put his arm about her, and kissed her cheek.
"You have a right to your caprices," he said. "Go to your summer haunts of vice and fashion, if you wish to, and I will follow you as soon as I can; but we won't say any more about Europe, just at present, will we? Perhaps next year."