"So it is," Philip flashed, "and why not? Must we kill sentiment and go about with hearts of ice because our world is hard?"
"Is there no way to keep ourselves warm without poultices?" retorted Lawrence.
Claire sat down at the table. "Come on and enjoy your venison, you two, and have done with the ills of the universe."
The two men joined her. It was a strange trio: Claire, a dashing boy in Philip's made-over corduroys; Lawrence wearing his host's summer serge as though it were his own, and Philip looking at them, amusedly.
"I never quite recover from the charm of you in male attire," Ortez remarked, looking into her face.
"I've tried at times since our fortunate misfortune to imagine her in evening gowns and furs," said Lawrence; "but I always fail and end by getting her into some sort of barbaric costume belonging to the distant past."
"You are both flattering and both foolish," she told them. "It's my business to look well in clothes, you know, and it's masculine to admit my efficiency in a particularly feminine line."
"You were scarcely fascinatingly efficient in the garb in which you first appeared to me." Philip laughed at the recollection.
"That isn't fair. I would have been if I had had enough to eat."
She looked at him, and her eyes sparkled gaily.