The flame under the kettle had gone out. The tea had gone cold in their half-empty cups. The street below still hooted and droned with traffic. The clock still ticked from the mantelpiece.
"I ought to be going," she said, eying the clock.
"Yes." He, too, had risen: he, too, was trembling. "You ought to be going. It's nearly half-past six. But you'll come to me again. You'll come again--Aliette."
He found her gloves, her bag and parasol. Taking them, she knew that her hands had lost their coolness; little pearls of emotion moistened either palm. Her face, seen in the mirror over the mantelpiece, looked strangely flushed--different. For the flash of a second, her fastidiousness was in revulsion.
"You'll come again--soon?" he repeated.
"I don't know." Revulsion passed; but her hands, straightening her hat, shook as though in self-disdain. "Somehow, it doesn't seem fair--on either of us."
"But you must." His voice thrilled. "You must. We can't leave things like this--undecided."
Self-possessed once more, she faced him. "Don't try to hurry me, Ronnie. We've talked too much this afternoon. My brain's weary. I can't decide anything. I thought that, being with you, things would be easier. They're not. They're more difficult. You must give me time----"
"Then"--his voice saddened--"I haven't been any help to you?"
A laugh rose in her throat, dimpling it. "I'm afraid we're neither of us very wise; but"--she offered him her ungloved hand--"it's been very sweet, being with you. That's why--you haven't helped me very much."