“England must have great faith in your discretion,” said Lilah Lindsay, and O’Hara’s face suddenly flamed like the Crusader’s of old.
“God grant it’s not misplaced,” he said simply. “It’s sleepless I’ve gone these many nights looking for a way out—and now I think we’ve found one that’s neither too hard nor too weak. It’s been weary work hunting it. You see it’s not only Ireland we must help; it’s all the little, unhappy countries lost in the dark, and like to kill themselves before they find the light. Sometimes it breaks the heart in your body to watch them.” His eyes were sombre with all the useless pain in the world.
“Then don’t let’s watch them for a little while,” she said gently. “I should think shame on myself for making you talk shop this way; I do, I do! But it’s hard to shake it off, isn’t it?”
“Not when you smile like that.”
Lilah Lindsay smiled like that again.
“Now and then,” she murmured, “you are just about six years old.”
“Why did you cut off your hair?” demanded O’Hara, and his voice was a trifle unsteady.
“Why?” She brushed it back with light fingers, gay as a child once more. “Oh, it used to take me hours to wind it about my head and coil it over my ears; it was way below my waist, you know, and I found it very distracting, to me and—other people. Don’t you like it this way?”
“Below your waist,” he said. “Oh, then you must be a real Fairy Princess, all shining white and gold.”
“But don’t you like it this way?” asked Delilah.