Colonel Innes detached himself from a group of men in mess dress as she appeared with the Worsleys, and let himself drift with the tide that brought them always together.
‘You are looking tired—ill,’ she said, seriously, as they sought the unconfessed solace of each other’s eyes. ‘Last night it was the Commander-in-Chief’s, and the night before the dance at Peliti’s. And again tonight. And you are not like those of us who can rest next morning—you have always your heavy office work!’ She spoke with indignant, tender reproach, and he gave himself up to hearing it. ‘You will have to take leave and go away,’ she insisted, foolishly.
‘Leave! Good heavens, no! I wish all our fellows were as fit as I am. And—’
‘Yes?’ she said.
‘Don’t pity me, dear friend. I don’t think it’s good for me. The world really uses me very well.’
‘Then it’s all right, I suppose,’ Madeline said, with sudden depression.
‘Of course it is. You are dining with us on the eighth?’
‘I’m afraid not, I’m engaged.’
‘Engaged again? Don’t you WANT to break bread in my house, Miss Anderson?’ She was silent, and he insisted, ‘Tell me,’ he said.
She gave him instead a kind, mysterious smile.