"You see, it leads nowhere," said she.
"Doesn't it?" said he.
The little room in the Cliff-side was whiter than ever, burning white, it was, where the sun faced it. But the east side of it was in shadow, and they sat there, under the great forehead of the Cliff.
They were both silent. Lucy was thinking of how he had found her there, and of the fear and trouble of last night. He vowed that if he could help it there should be no more fear and no more trouble for her. In their silence, voices thin and sweet with distance, came to them from below, where children played on the beach among the rocks that, washed by water-springs from the Cliff's forehead to its foot, lay heaped where they had fallen. She listened and laughed.
She was happy now. He watched her as she stretched her adorable feet to the sun. A little wind came from the sea and played with her, taking from her a slight scent of violets for its salt. Every nerve in his body was aware of her nearness.
Only last night he had seen her crouching just there, in the darkness, convulsed, her face wet with rain and tears. It was good that the place they had chosen should be changed and cleansed for them by sunlight and wind from the sea and the sweet voices of children.
She did not break the silence. She only looked at him once with eyes whose pupils, black and dilated, narrowed the blue ring of the iris.
Then he spoke. "I was going to say something to you last night, but I didn't. There was something I wanted to know first, something I wasn't quite sure about."
She turned her face from him. The light struck it, and it quivered and grew white.
"Well, do you know now?"