“I didn’t know,” he hastened to explain, “but what you had met with an accident.”
She looked whole enough. He surmised that the letter was the cause of her agitation. If so, he certainly was intruding. Her black eyes, full, Italian, swept by long lashes, seemed to tell him so.
“No,” she murmured, “it is nothing; just bad news. It came so unexpectedly.”
Her lips moved rhythmically to the music of a sweetly lyrical voice. Her teeth were as white as those of the orange-colored cat. She fitted marvelously well into the scene above the valley. Consequently he parried a little to prolong an interview to which he knew he had no right.
“Luckily, bad news generally does come unexpectedly,” he said.
She flashed a look at him as though to fathom his intent. Then she glanced swiftly towards the brick house and seemed instantly in her grief to forget that he was there.
“It will kill him,” she exclaimed below her breath.
Still he hesitated, impressed by the weight of her sorrow.
“If I may be of any service,” he ventured, “I’m on my way to the next village. Any letter or wire—”
She looked up.