“Me dear?”
“There’s something I want to say. ... To-morrow Mr Glynn will be here. Pat’s asked him to come back after church. He is going away on Monday, so it will be the last time. Be careful, darling! Think what you’re about. You don’t want to be unkind—”
Pixie stared—a stunned, incredulous stare.
“Unkind! To him! Are you raving? What am I to be careful about?”
“Oh—oh—everything!” Bridgie’s breath came in a gasp of helplessness. It had been difficult to speak, but a sense of duty had driven her on, and now it was too late to stop. “Don’t—don’t talk to him so much. Don’t look at him.” (Did Pixie realise how instinctively her eyes sought Stephen’s for sympathy and appreciation?) “Don’t sit by the fire and sing.”
A flush spread over Pixie’s cheek; her eyes widened.
“Why? Doesn’t he like it? Isn’t it nice?”
“Oh-oh, Pixie!” cried Bridgie helplessly. A vision rose before her of a little figure in a rose-coloured gown, of the firelight playing on the upturned face. She heard again, the deep crooning notes which filled the room with sweetness. To herself, a sister, the picture was full of charm—what must it be to a lonely man, in love for the first time in thirty-five years? She rose from her chair and came across to the bed: face to face, within the stretch of an arm, the sisters waited in silence, while the clock on the mantelpiece ticked out a long minute. “Pixie,” whispered Bridgie breathlessly, “don’t you know?”
“What?”
“Don’t you know, Pixie, that he loves you?”