“I’d love to have lived in Eden,” said Jane, unexpectedly, “before Eve and Adam sinned. What it must have meant to have all those great beasts mild-mannered and purring under your hand like this kitten. What a dreadful thing happened, Evans, when fear came into the world.”
“What makes you say that now, Jane?” His voice was sharp.
“Shouldn’t I have said it? Oh, Evans, you can’t think I had you in mind——”
“No,” with a touch of weariness, “but you are the only one, really, who knows what a coward I am——”
“Evans, you’re not.”
“You’re good to say it, but that’s what I came over for. I am up against it again, Jane. Some cousins are on from New York—they’re at the New Willard—and Mother and I went in to see them last night. They have invited us to go back with them. They’ve a big house east of Fifth Avenue, and they want us as their guests indefinitely. They think it will do me a lot of good—get me out of myself, they call it. But I can’t see it. Since I came home—every time I think of facing mobs of people”—again his voice grew sharp—“I’m clutched by something I can’t describe. It is perfectly unreasonable, but I can’t help it.”
For a moment they walked in silence, then he went on—“Mother’s very keen about it. She thinks it will set me up. But I want to stay here—and I thought if you’d talk to her, she’ll listen to you, Jane—she always does.”
“Does she know how you feel about it?”
“No, I think not. I’ve never told her. I’ve only spilled over to you now and then. It would hurt Mother, no end, to know how changed I am.”
Jane laid her hand on his arm. “You’re not. Brace up, old dear. You aren’t dead yet.” As she lifted her head to look up at him, the hood of her cape slipped back, and the wind blew her soft, thick hair against his cheek. “But I’ll talk to your mother if you want me to. She is a great darling.”