“I have always been like that ever since I was a child. What is called, I believe, ‘a little delicate.’ I get very easily over-tired. Then if I don’t pull up and recuperate with bed and Benger, I get an attack of pain....”
“Of pain! My poor darling!”
“Unbearable. I mean I can’t bear it. Gabriel, don’t you think you are doing a very foolish thing, taking this half-broken life of mine?”
“If only the time were here!”
“Sometimes I think it will never come,” she sighed. “I am clairvoyante in a way. I don’t see myself in harbour.”
“Only three weeks more, then you shall be as clairvoyante as you like.” He laughed happily, holding her to him.
On this visit she seemed glad of his love, to depend upon and need him. He always had that for which to be glad. In truth that weakness of which she spoke, and which was the cause, or perhaps the effect, of two unmistakable heart attacks, had left her in the mood for Gabriel Stanton, his serious tenderness, and deep, almost overwhelming devotion. She was a whimsical, strange little creature, genius as she called herself, and for the moment had ceased to act.
The weather changed, it rained almost continuously from Saturday night until Monday morning. They spent the time between the music room and the uncongenial dining-room where they had their meals. On the sofa, she lay practically in his arms, she sheltered there. She had been frightened by her own agitation and uncertainty; the attacks that followed. And now believed that all she needed was calm; happy certainty; Gabriel Stanton.
“Don’t make me care for you too much,” she said on one of these days. “I want you to rest me, not to get excited over you, to keep calm.”
“I am here only for you to use. Think of me as refuge, sanctuary, what you will.”