"I wish I might think so. I'd be there now if I weren't bound."
"It won't hurt either of you to wait until I come back," was the Doctor's ultimatum, and Derry, longing for sympathy, left him presently and made his way to the Toy Shop.
"If we were to wait ten years do you think I'd love her any more than I do now?" he demanded of Emily. "I should think he'd understand."
"Men never do understand," said Emily—"fathers. They think their own romance was unique, or they forget that there was ever any romance."
"If you could put in a word for us," ventured Derry.
"I am not sure that it would do any good; Bruce is a Turk."
A customer came, and Derry lingered disconsolately while Emily served her. More customers, among them a tall spare man with an upstanding bush of gray hair. He had a potted plant in his arms, wrapped in tissue paper. He set it on the counter and went away.
When Miss Emily discovered the plant, she asked Derry, "Who put it there?"
Derry described the man. "You were busy. He didn't stop."
The plant was a cyclamen, blood-red and beautiful.