“Oh, ’Raine,” he said abruptly, shuffling the cards with a fillip, “I may have to run off for a few days in a couple of weeks—all right?”
Lorraine did not answer; she bent her head over her work.
Dan looked at her sharply. “Isn’t it all right?” His voice had that dangerous gentleness at which she always winced.
“Is she coming back this summer?” She dropped the sewing.
Dan put aside the cards and came beside her. Under the flare of the reading light her face seemed thinner and more childish. There was a miraculous subtlety of features, a hidden delicate something which he could not analyze; he felt boorish, brutal, as absurd as when he was one of Thurley’s guests at a party and every one really made polite game of him.
He kept looking at Lorraine, wondering why this change had come about; tired purple shadows were under her eyes, the eyes themselves were soft, shining things seeming to look far beyond him.
She raised her hand, crumpling the sheer, white slip on which she was sewing.
“You mean Thurley,” he stammered, “well—I—I don’t know, dear, you see the Fincherie is Miss Clergy’s house and of course ... oh, ’Raine ... now, I understand,” his eyes staring at the tiny, gossamer dress!