She leaves him hastily—never without a sweet backward glance before—and he is left alone for hours.
When she returns it is evening, and the long shadows lie athwart the room, and she flits across the ladders of gloom to him as if innumerable bars were holding them apart.
But when they are all passed, and she is close by his side, he scans his Perdita's countenance with a conviction growing within him that bars are yet between them which she cannot pass, and he seizes her hand in sudden foreboding.
"What is this, dear child? Why are you so pale and troubled? Have you been weeping?"
"Oh, nothing of consequence. Have you been comfortable?"
"Everything is of consequence which brings these marks of sorrow to my Perdita's face. Who has been vexing you, child?"
"No one—no one, sir."
"Who has been grieving you, then?"
"I—it is no one's fault. I have only been a little foolish—that is all."
She averts her pallid face, and will not be questioned more, but leads him utterly from personal subjects.