The delicate face beside him clouded.
"He won't accept it."
Anderson shook his head. "I think he must."
Elizabeth looked at him in despair.
"Oh! no. You oughtn't to do this--indeed, indeed you oughtn't. It is cowardly--forgive me!--unworthy of you. Oh! can't you see how the sympathy of everybody who knows--everybody whose opinion you care for--"
She stopped a moment, colouring deeply, checked indeed by the thought of a conversation between herself and Philip of the night before. Anderson interrupted her:
"The sympathy of one person," he said hoarsely, "is very precious to me. But even for her--"
She held out her hands to him again imploringly--
"Even for her?--"
But instead of taking the hands he rose and went out on the balcony a moment, as though to look at the great view. Then he returned, and stood over her.