“Roger! Do take care, dear. You’ll lose your hat or——”
“Or my head? Mustn’t lose that, or it will be all up with me, considering that I lost my heart ages ago!”
He laughed as he settled himself in the seat opposite her, but he did not meet her eyes, dark with trouble and perplexity. She loved him with all the strength of her nature—a nature essentially sweet and pure and steadfast. She thought she understood his every mood; but now, on this supreme day that linked her life to his once and for all, his manner was so strange that her heart failed her.
His restless gaze lighted on a tea-basket and a pile of periodicals ranged on the cushions beside her.
“Hallo! So he thought of the tea after all. Good old George! Let’s have it, shall we, darling?”
He talked gaily, irresponsibly, as they drank their tea but she was not deceived—was more than ever certain that he was concealing something from her, though what it might be she could not imagine.
Presently she leant back in her corner and closed her eyes, but after an interval of silence she glanced up. Roger’s face was concealed behind a newspaper, which he appeared to be studying intently.
“Any news?” she asked. “I don’t believe I’ve looked at a paper for days.”
He did not lower the sheet immediately, and she noticed, half mechanically, that his grip on it tightened. She recalled later, as one does recall such trifles when circumstances have invested them with special significance, the little convulsive movement of his hands—fine, characteristic hands they were, strong and nervous.
“Nothing of any consequence; these rags are all alike,” he answered, as he tossed the paper out of the open window and moved impetuously to her side. “Grace! My own—my very own at last, there’s nothing in the world matters to you and me to-day except ourselves!”