Breton was glad when the little maid told him that Mrs. Rand was out, but that Miss Lizzie was at home. He saw her in the warm cosy room, sitting before the fire with her toes on the fender and her skirts pulled up, drying her shoes.
She looked up and smiled at him and told him to sit down, but did not move from her position.
"Mother's out at a matinee with Daisy. I got away early this afternoon. Do you hate snow, Mr. Breton?"
"I hate it to-day. I've got the dumps. I had to find someone to talk to or I'd have gone screaming into the street——"
"Couldn't find anyone better, so took me—thank you for the compliment. But I like the snow. Your pool's more like a pool now than ever, Mr. Breton."
He went across to the window and stood there looking at the little square now white with the gaunt trees rising black from the heart of it and the grey houses that hemmed it in. Over it the snow, yellow and grey and then delicately white, swirled and tossed.
He came back and sat down beside her and wondered at her neat comfort and air of calm control of all her emotions and desires.
She, looking at him, saw that he was ill. Dark lines beneath his eyes, his cheeks pale and an air of picturesque melancholy that made her want first to laugh at him and then mother him.
"I know what's the matter with you," she said, nodding her head.
"What?"