She drew her hand away from his as if his touch had hurt her. Her smile was the still, bloodless smile that comes with pain. She drew her chair back out of the sunlight, in the recess by the fireplace. He stood beside her then, looking at her with eyes that loved her the more for the sad hurt to her beauty. His manner recalled the shy, adolescent uncertainty of his first approaches.
"Don't you think," he said, "you ought to have stayed in bed?"
She shook her head and struggled to find her voice. It came convulsively.
"No. I'm better. I'm all right now."
"It was being out in that beastly hot sun yesterday—with those youngsters. You're not used to it."
She laughed. "No. I'm not used to it. Robert—you haven't told them, have you?"
"What?"
"About you—and me?"
"No. Not yet." He smiled. "I say, I shall have to tell them very soon, shan't I?"
"You needn't."