"I don't think we had better go to the balcony." "Shiela, can't you ever get over being ashamed when I make love to you?"
"I don't want to get over it, Garry."
"Are you still afraid to let me love you?"
Her mouth curved gravely as a perplexed child's; she looked down at the table where his sun-burnt hand now lay lightly across hers.
"I wished to speak to you about myself—if, somehow you could help me to say what—what is very difficult for a girl to say to a man—even when she loves him.... I don't think I can say it, but I'll try."
"Then if you'll come to the balcony—"
"No, I can't trust you—or myself—unless we promise each other."
"Have I got to do that again?"
"Yes, if I am to go with you. I promise! Do you?"
"If I must," he said with very bad grace—so ungraciously in fact that as they passed from the eastern corridor on to the Spanish balcony she forgot her own promise and slipped her hand into his in half-humourous, half-tender propitiation.