"Perhaps they didn't have time to think, and didn't want to hurt the person who asked it. And—and—if they were willing to do the thing later, sometime in the future, wouldn't that make up for it?"
"I can't tell. I don't know enough about it. I don't understand what you mean." He turned, trying to make himself more comfortable. "Lord, how hard this ground is! I believe it's solid iron underneath."
He stretched and curled on the blanket, elongating his body in a mighty yawn which subsided into the solaced note of a groan. "There, that's better. I ache all over to-night."
She made no answer, looking at the prospect from morose brows. More at ease he returned to the subject and asked, "Who's been telling lies?"
"I," she answered.
He gave a short laugh, that drew from her a look of quick protest. He was lying on his side, one arm crooked under his head, his eyes on her in a languid glance where incredulity shone through amusement.
"Your father told me once you were the most truthful woman he'd ever known, and I agree with him."
"It was to my father I lied," she answered.
She began to tremble, for part at least of the story was on her lips. She clasped her shaking hands round her knees, and, not looking at him, said "David," and then stopped, stifled by the difficulties and the longing to speak.
David answered by laughing outright, a pleasant sound, not guiltless of a suggestion of sleep, a laugh of good nature that refuses to abdicate. It brushed her back into herself as if he had taken her by the shoulders, pushed her into her prison, and slammed the door.