The iridescent mood of the afternoon was gone, and reaching for the deeper and more firm basis of emotion between them, she braced herself to speak of another thing she had not told him.
Constraint had fallen upon them; they were separated by their diverging thoughts, and uneasily, with effort, they broke the silence with disconnected scraps of talk. Time was going by; already twilight crept into the room, and looking at his watch, Paul spoke of his train. Helen led the way to the porch, where the shade of climbing rose-vines softened the last clear gray light of the day. There was sadness in this wan reflection of the departed sunlight; the air was still, and the creaking of the wicker chair, when Helen settled into it, the sharp crackle of Paul's match as he lighted his after-dinner cigar, seemed irreverently loud. With a sudden keen need to be nearer him, Helen drew a deep breath, preparing to speak and to clear away forever the last barrier between them.
But his words met hers before they were uttered.
"What are you going to do, then, Helen?—If you aren't going home?" he added, before her uncomprehension.
"Oh, that! Why—I haven't thought exactly. I'd like to stay at home, stay here in my own house. There's so much to do in a house," she said, vaguely. "I've never had time to do it before."
His voice was indulgent.
"That'll be fine! It's just what you ought to have a chance to do. But, see here, Helen, of course it's none of my business yet, in a way, but naturally I'd worry about it. It takes an income to keep up a house, you know. I'd like—you know everything I've got is—is just the same as yours, already."
"Paul, you dear! Don't worry about that at all. If I needed any help I'd ask you, truly. But I don't."
"Well, we might as well look at it practically," he persisted. "It's going to figure up maybe more than you think to keep this house going. Not that I want you to give it up if you'd rather stay here," he parenthesized, quickly. "I'd rather have you here than in Masonville, and I'd rather have you in Ripley than here, for that matter. Say, why couldn't you come down there? I could fix up that little bungalow on Harper Street. And every one knows you're an old friend of mother's."
"I might do something like that," she said at random. She was troubled by the knowledge that their hour was slipping past and the conversation going in the wrong direction.