"I wanted to make sure of lighting in a right place," said Faith. "Endy"—and her voice came back to the rich softness of the tones of her first question, a little dashed with timidity,—"has anybody been putting 'nonsense' into your head?"
He lifted her hand from its resting place, bringing it round to his cheek and lips at first in silence,
"Do you know," he said, "that is just the point over which I thought you were hovering?"—But the certainty had changed his tone. And rising up quick and suddenly, he drew her off to the sofa and seated her there, keeping his arm still about her as if for a shield.
"Faith," he said, "do you remember that I promised some time to tell you a long story?"
She looked up into his face gravely and affectionately, reading his look. "But you won't have time for it now, Endecott—tea will be ready directly. We must wait till by and by."
"My little Sunbeam," he said, looking at her and gently pushing back her hair, "do you know I love you very much!—What made you think there was anything in my head but the most profound and abstract sense?"
Faith shook her head with a little bit of a smile.
"I saw that you were growing either more sensible of late—or less,—and I wanted to know which it was."
"Please to explain yourself! How could I grow more sensible?—and in what way did I grow less?"
"I am talking nonsense," said Faith simply. "But if it was sense in your head, Endy, there was a little too much of it; and I had seen nonsense look so—so I wanted to know."