“You don’t think best to ask her to supper with us?” questioned Red, as the others disappeared into the now empty shop.
“I asked her and she refused. I knew she would.”
“Don’t wonder. These blamed last stunts——”
Red lapsed into a dark silence, his chin sunk upon his broad chest.
Within the shop Black turned to Sue. “Go out in the garden, and wait, will you, Sue?” he asked, with the smile which the child would have obeyed no matter what request had gone with it. Reluctantly she closed the shop door behind her. In the dismantled, empty place, where he had first met Jane nearly eighteen months before, Black said what he had come in to say.
“I shall write—and you will answer. We can’t do without that, can we? And there’s no reason why we should. Is that understood?”
“If you wish it.”
“Don’t you wish it?”
“Yes.”
“Thank you for standing by me this day. I know it’s been hard for you. I couldn’t help that—I had to have you. You’re not sorry—you stayed by?”