"Oh, do you think I could! I'd do anything—anything to help Owen," she said eagerly. "It wouldn't be like his articles, full of quotations and things that want verifying, would it? I mean even a stupid girl—like me—could do it, couldn't she?"
"You're not stupid," he rallied her gaily. "Look how quickly you learned to read proof! And even the superior Miss Loder doesn't type as well as you!"
"Doesn't she!" Toni's depression had vanished like magic, and her eyes were sparkling as she looked at him. "Oh, if I could! But I don't believe I dare offer, Mr. Raymond! Do you think if you were to mention it to Owen——"
"Oh, it would come much better from you!" Barry, whose interference on the subject of Owen's marriage had not been too well received, shrank from further officiousness. "If you propose it, I'm sure Owen will jump at it; and he won't mind his enforced helplessness half so much if he can get on with the book."
For a moment Toni said nothing.
The rain had ceased, and in the darkened sky one or two pale-gold stars were gleaming. The air was full of sweet, moist scents; and a big white owl flew by the window, looking weird and ghostly in the dusk. A moment later they heard him hoot from his eyrie in one of the tall tree-tops, and Toni shivered a little.
"I can't get used to their queer cries," she said in a low voice. "Sometimes I hear them in the night, and they make me shudder. Owen laughs at me, and quotes Shakespeare, about the owl and the baker's daughter, but I hate them, all the same."
"I rather like them," said Barry lightly. "Anyway, you mustn't drive them away; it's the very worst of luck to turn them out of their accustomed dwelling-places!"
"Then, they'll have to stop, I suppose," said Toni practically. "But I shall go on hating them all the same!"
Barry laughed and turned the conversation back to her proposed collaboration with Owen; and Toni was only too eager to discuss the subject, which lasted, indeed, until Barry said good-bye.