‘I shall want to weep in a minute,’ she interrupted. ‘You ought to go on the stage, Roger.’
‘I am on the stage, Gladys. I’m on it all the time, but only wander about trying to remember what my next cue is, and what the play’s about, and wondering who the devil can be in the audience. But you’ve ruined my exhortation now. I’ll have to trust to the libation. Here goes.’ He held out the flask and raised his voice again. ‘Accept this offering, all that we can give, the last drops of our golden spirit.’ The flask was solemnly emptied into the water just outside the door.
‘Well, d’you feel any better now?’ she enquired as he returned to her side. She was smiling at him.
He had twisted round, so that they were sitting face to face, and now his hands shot out to clasp her arms. ‘Do you know, I believe I do,’ he cried. ‘I think they’d had a glance at us—those gods, I mean—even before I made the libation, and now they may really take notice of us. When I come to think of it, I’ve felt depressed only once to-night, and that’s almost a record.’
‘When was that?’ She pressed gently against the hands that were still curved loosely round her arms.
‘Oh, before you arrived; just after we went into the house. I can remember the very moment. I’d been left alone, and suddenly everything went as hollow as hell—perhaps you don’t know the feeling?’
‘Don’t I though! I’ve had weeks of it, when it’s a bother to breathe, let alone get up and wash and do your hair and dress and eat——’
‘And walk about and talk to people or even look at their silly eyes, and then undress and crawl into bed, to try and sleep, and after that begin it all over again. I know. Still, I shouldn’t have thought you would.’
‘Well, I do,’ she said gravely. ‘Why did you think I didn’t?’
‘You seemed to have so much life in you, good red stuff,’ he replied, considering her. ‘I couldn’t imagine anything downing you for more than a minute. I don’t believe it does.’