Virginia laughed, blushing again.
“What would we do if we all liked the same thing?” she asked lightly, and then, very sweetly: “William, I think your wife is beautiful. At first, one can’t decide, the face is so charming, so piquant; but when she smiles and those dark eyes of hers dwell on you—she’s beautiful!”
William said nothing for a moment. He was sitting in the colonel’s chair, his hat on his knees, and Virginia could see new haggard lines in his face. He did not look at her, but away toward a distant spire that appeared above the thick foliage, like a finger pointing upward.
“Yes, she’s beautiful,” he admitted at last, almost with reluctance.
Virginia, aware that he was thinking of days long ago, when he had taken her to church and carried her books home from school, felt her breath coming short. She was trying hard, but if he would not meet her half-way, how could she patch it up?
She averted her face, toying with her grandfather’s empty glass. The ice still jingled in it a little, and William started. He remembered jingling the ice in the glasses on the inn table, and Fanchon’s eyes seemed to mock him. He drew a long sigh.
“I hope you don’t mind my sitting here, Virginia,” he said gravely. “It’s—it’s so homelike. I can’t bear to go. I suppose lost spirits hang around sometimes outside the gates of paradise.”
Virginia caught her breath this time. She dared not look at him. She had taken a ring out of her pocket and held it out in the palm of her hand; but now, looking at his set profile, she hardly dared to speak of it. Her hand trembled; he was unhappy, and he had come to her! Something like fear showed in her eyes, but she forced herself to speak.
“I wish you’d come in and see grandfather. He’d be glad, I know. We meant to come to see your wife again—some evening when you would be at home.”
William lifted his head slowly and looked at her.