Feathers was kneeling on the grassy bank to which the punt was moored, his head a little downbent, his brows furiously frowning.
All her life Marie remembered him as he looked then, such a big, very masculine man, with his great shoulders and ugly head, his jaw thrust out in an obstinate line, and yet—there seemed to be something strangely helpless about him, something that seemed to contradict the angry tone in which he had just spoken.
Then, quite suddenly he looked up and their eyes met, Marie's hot and ashamed, though she could not have explained why, and his trying so hard not to betray the agitation that was rending him.
"Are you angry with me?" she faltered. "Oh, don't be angry with me." And, covering her face with her hands, she burst into tears.
Feathers got up abruptly and stood with averted head staring down stream.
The river was flowing swiftly just there, and it was carrying with it a little toy boat which someone had twisted out of a newspaper.
Feathers followed its passage mechanically. It seemed symbolical of his life during the past ten years, during which he had just allowed himself to drift helplessly with the tide, until now, when 172 he stood face to face with the disaster of the hidden rock of a girl's simplicity and desperate unhappiness.
Feathers was no fool, and he knew quite well that Marie's tears were the outcome of all she had suffered since her marriage.
She had looked for love and happiness, and had found neither. She had been flung back on herself and his friendship, and in her gratitude for the little he had done to try and cheer her she had magnified her affection for him.
He did some swift thinking as he stood there, his face resolutely turned from her as she sat crying desolately.