"But my dear!" he said, as one might speak to a child, "why aren't you in bed? It's just dawn."
"Oh," she said, "I waited and I waited. It seemed you must come. I read a book. And then I fell asleep." And then with a sob of feeble self-pity, "And here I am!" She rubbed the back of her hand into one eye and shivered. "I'm cold," she said, "and I want some tea."
"Let's make some," said Trafford.
"It's been horrible waiting," said Marjorie without moving; "horrible! Where have you been?"
"I've been working. I got excited by my work. I've been at the laboratory. I've had the best spell of work I've ever had since our marriage."
"But I have been up all night!" she cried with her face and voice softening to tears. "How could you? How could you?"
He was surprised by her weeping. He was still more surprised by the self-abandonment that allowed her to continue. "I've been working," he repeated, and then looked about with a man's helplessness for the tea apparatus. One must have hot water and a teapot and a kettle; he would find those in the kitchen. He strolled thoughtfully out of the room, thinking out the further details of tea-making all mixed up with amazement at Marjorie, while she sat wiping her eyes with a crumpled pocket-handkerchief. Presently she followed him down with the rug about her like a shawl, and stood watching him as he lit a fire of wood and paper among the ashes in the kitchen fireplace. "It's been dreadful," she said, not offering to help.
"You see," he said, on his knees, "I'd really got hold of my work at last."
"But you should have sent——"
"I was thinking of my work. I clean forgot."