When his letter came that told her he couldn’t leave his office at this moment, she could not at first believe it, any more than she could at first believe that he had gone away.
Alec was there, and he asked me shortly:—
“Why couldn’t Roger come?”
“He’s busy,” I said.
Alec gave me an odd look.
“One can do what one wants to,” said he.
He was one of those over whom Love passes a maturing hand. At twenty he had lost the young-robin look of expression, just as he had lost early the puppy aspect that a boy has before he has gotten used to man-size hands and feet.
“It’s hard,” he said, “to sit back and do nothing. It’s hard when you love any one as I do Ellen not to be able to get for her any of the things in life that she wants the most.”
“What does she want,” I asked, “that she hasn’t?”
“Well,” Alec reflected, “I can come to see her every week and Roger can’t.” He might have said: “I can spend my life on her and give her every thought of my heart and stand between her and unhappiness as much as I can, and Roger can’t.”