‘Rosemary, of course,’ he cried, forgetting both patience and ceremony. ‘You didn’t tell me.’
‘I didn’t tell you?’ Sheila repeated in astonishment.
Flushed and gloomy, he made equine plunges towards the explanation he considered so superfluous.
‘Well, didn’t you know? Of course, you must have known. Yet how should you?’
‘Know!’ echoed Sheila. ‘Know that she was married?’
‘No, no.’ Impatiently he shook the suggestion away. ‘What it means to me—you must have known that?’
‘My poor boy! What does it mean to you?’
They stared at each other with troubled eyes.
‘Everything,’ answered his helpless gesture.
Her face contracted with pain. She bowed her head. With pain, swiftly, she bowed her head. For one terrible moment he thought she was going to weep.