"I am interested," Geraldine assured him, gently withdrawing her hand. "You needn't doubt that. But won't you come up to the house?"
Andrew laughed with a trace of awkwardness as he realized that he had been standing at the top of the uncomfortably narrow steps by which one reached the pier.
"It might be better, if you and Mr. Frobisher are not engaged."
"He's writing letters, though I think he'll have finished soon. Wherever he is, he's generally busy; but I can answer for his being glad to see you."
"That's good to hear. I'm heavily in your father's debt; but I'd like to think he's not the only one in the family to feel the pleasure."
Geraldine smiled at him mockingly.
"How delightfully formal, Mr. Allinson! Besides, you seem to need a good deal of assuring."
"A fair shot," Andrew laughed. "I'm afraid, when I'm really in earnest, I'm apt to be stilted; but perhaps it isn't an altogether unusual fault. The correct light touch seems hard to acquire."
"Not stilted; that's too harsh. Now and then you're rather too serious."
Looking at her steadily, he saw amusement in her eyes, but he had not wit enough to read all it covered and he felt slightly chilled. The girl knew his love for her and had thought of him often and anxiously in his absence; but now that he had come back safe and successful she was seized by a strange timidity. She shrank from the drastic change in their relations which his attitude threatened; he must be kept at a distance until she had become more used to the situation.