He caught himself twisting his neck nervously within his collar. And his hands were clenched; his toes, even, were drawn up tightly in his shoes.
'Gotta relax,' he told himself again.
Then he felt for the little box. This time he transferred it to a trousers pocket; held it tight in his hand there.
A door opened and closed. There was a distant rustling. Henry, paler, sprang to his feet.
'I must be cool,' he thought. 'Think before I speak. Everything depends on my steadiness now.'
But the step was not Cicely's. She was slim and light. This was a solid tread.
He gripped the little box more tightly. He was meeting with a curious difficulty in breathing.
Then, in the doorway, appeared the large person, the hooked nose, the determined mouth, the piercing, hawklike eyes of Madame Watt.
'How d'do, Henry,' she said, in her deep voice. 'Sit down. I want to talk to you. About Cicely. I'm going to tell you frankly—I like you, Henry; I believe you're going to amount to something one of these days—but I had no idea—now I want you to take this in the spirit I say it in—I had no idea things were going along so fast between Cicely and you. I've trusted you. I've let you two play together all you liked. And I won't say I'd stand in the way, a few years from now——
'A few years!...'