She hesitates. “A little, yes. Like the old woman and ghosts. I may not believe in it but I'm afraid of it, rather.”
She gives him a steady look—her eyes go deep. It is not so much the intensity of the look as its haltingness that makes warmth go over him.
“Shall we tell our dreams—the favorite ones, I mean? Play fair if we do, remember,” she adds slowly.
“Not if you're really afraid.”
“I? But it's just because I am afraid that I really should, you know. Like going into a dark room when you don't want to.”
“But they can't be as scary as that, surely.” Ted's voice is a little false. Both are watching each other intently now—he with a puzzled sense of lazy enveloping firelight.
“Well, shall I begin? After all this is tea in the Village.”
“I should be very much interested indeed, Mrs. Severance,” says Ted rather gravely. “Check!” “How official you sound—almost as if you had a lot of those funny little machines all the modern doctors use and were going to mail me off to your pet sanatorium at once because you'd asked me what green reminded me of and I said 'cheese' instead of 'trees.' And anyhow, I never have any startling dreams—only silly ones—much too silly to tell—”
“Please go on.” Ted's voice has really become quite clinical.
“Oh very well. They don't count when you only have them once—just when they keep coming back and back to you—isn't that it?”