"Why—Owen!" she said. "Owen!"
She ran to him with a joyful relaxation of her staidness, both hands outstretched. He waited for her to come up to him. There was something at once proud and humble in that deliberate waiting. He held his head well up like a soldier, challenging nothing, fearing nothing.
It was the first time that they had met since the day when he had seen her off on her way to Trichy. Between then and now there had been the Feast of Siva and her marriage. She looked up at him, her hands in his quiet grasp.
One side of his face had no resemblance to the other. It had been smashed and mended into a grotesque hideousness—into a leering distortion. The eye was completely closed. The whole face looked like a divided mask—one half human, the other devilish. It was intensely, cruelly pitiable.
Anne neither winced nor changed colour. She looked up at him steadily.
"Dear Owen!" she said. "Dear Owen!"
The one half of his poor twisted mouth smiled.
"I've been hesitating outside for about an hour—listening to your voices. I didn't like to come in—I was afraid of startling you. I suppose you knew—but one can talk about things one can't face."
He lisped a little, but the lisp could not weaken his simple, unconscious dignity.
"You should have come before," she answered. "I have thought so much of you."