She opened her heavy eyes.
"Jim!"
He hurried to her, knelt beside her. He stroked her hair as a father strokes the hair of his weary child.
"My poor little girl!" he said.
Had she thought at all coherently about his coming, she had not meant to suffer his caresses until she had told him something of what had occurred. But, before she found time to begin a narrative of the truth, or the half truth, he began to pet her. She could not confess to him while he did that.
"I thought you were lost," she said. "We looked, but couldn't find you anywhere. I thought you might have been run over. I thought—I hardly know what I thought."
"My dear little girl!" he murmured. He patted her left hand. He reached for its fellow. "Why," he cried, "you've hurt yourself!"
Muriel started.
"No, no!" she said. "It's nothing. Truly, it's nothing. It's——" She laughed shrilly. "I asked Captain von Klausen to open the window. It stuck—the window, I mean. He put his hand through the glass and cut his wrist. I bandaged it. I scratched myself when I picked up some of the pieces from the floor."
She realised that she had gone too far to retreat. She had lied again to her husband, and for no adequate reason. She had crossed the Rubicon of marital ethics.