"It won't do to sit there and converse so frankly," he said. "Nobody overhearing you would understand either you or me."
The girl nodded. One heavy braid fell across her shoulder, and she took the curling, burnished ends between her fingers and began to rebraid them absently. After a moment she sighed, bent her head and looked down at him between the spindles.
"I am sorry I have annoyed you," she whispered.
"You didn't."
"Oh, I did! It wouldn't do to have people think—what—couldn't be true.... But, Jim, can't you forgive a girl who is entirely alone in the world, clinging to every moment of companionship with her closest friend? And can't you understand her being afraid that something might happen to him—to take him away—and the most blessed friendship that—that she ever even dreamed of in—in the dreadful solitude which was her youth?"
"You dear child—of course I understand.... I never have enough of you, either. Your interest and friendship and loyalty are no warmer than are mine for you.... But you mustn't become morbid; nothing is going to alter our regard for each other; nothing is going to happen to either you or me." He laughed. "So you really need not sit up nights for me, if I happen to be out."
She laughed too, framed her cheeks in her hands, and looked down at him with smiling, humorous eyes which grew subtly tender.
"You do care for me, Jim?"
"Why should I deny it?"
"Why should I? I don't. I know I care for you more than everything else in the world——