"Sometimes Athalie lunched there in the garden with him."
His face went white, but he smiled and rose,—came back swiftly to kiss her hands—then entered the house and telephoned to New York.
When he came back to her she was ready to rise, lean on his arm, and walk leisurely to the house.
On the way she called his attention to a pale blue sheet of forget-me-nots spreading under the shrubbery. She noticed other new blossoms in the garden, lingered before the bed of white pansies. "Like little faces," she said with a faint smile.
One silvery-grey iris he broke from its sheathed stem and gave her; she moved slowly on with the scented blossom lifted to her lips.
In the hall a starched and immaculate nurse met her with a significant nod of understanding. And so, between Clive and the trained nurse she mounted the stairs to her room.