“No, please don’t.” He bent towards her and touched her hand. “That’s only because you haven’t seen other people much. I’m most awfully ordinary, quite a commonplace sort of chap. I’d be awfully sick with myself really if I had time to think about it, but there’s such a lot going on that one simply can’t bother. But you’ll do me a lot of good if you’ll let me come.”
“I!” She opened her eyes wide. “How funny you are! I’m no use to anybody.”
“We’re both most fearfully modest,” he said, smiling, “and when people say how rotten they are they generally mean just the opposite. But I don’t, really. I mean it absolutely.” Then he lowered his voice. “We’re friends, aren’t we?”
“Yes,” she said, very softly.
“Always?”
“Yes, always.”
His hand took hers very gently. At the touch of her fingers his heart began suddenly to pound his breast so that he could not hear, a quiver shook his body, he bent his head.
“I’m an awfully poor sort of fellow,” he said in a whisper.
The mulberry tree, the lawn, the shining windows, the flowers caught the tone and for one moment fell like a burning cloud about the two, then the light died away.