“I? Why should I do that?”
“Then where's Harrison?” he demanded, querulously.
She told him one of the few white lies of her life when she said: “He hasn't been well. He'll be over to-morrow.” She sat down and picked up the prayer-book, only to find him lifting himself in the bed and listening.
“Somebody closed the hall door, Lucy. If it's Reynolds, I want to see him.”
She got up and went to the head of the stairs. The light was low in the hall beneath, and she saw a man standing there. But she still wore her reading glasses, and she saw at first hardly more than a figure.
“Is that you, Doctor Reynolds?” she asked, in her high old voice.
Then she put her hand to her throat and stood rigid, staring down. For the man had whipped off his cap and stood with his arms wide, looking up.
Holding to the stair-rail, her knees trembling under her, Lucy went down, and not until Dick's arms were around her was she sure that it was Dick, and not his shabby, weary ghost. She clung to him, tears streaming down her face, still in that cautious silence which governed them both; she held him off and looked at him, and then strained herself to him again, as though the sense of unreality were too strong, and only the contact of his rough clothing made him real to her.
It was not until they were in her sitting-room with the door closed that either of them dared to speak. Or perhaps, could speak. Even then she kept hold of him.
“Dick!” she said. “Dick!”