He plucked at the grass, but did not smile as was his wont.
“What is it, Gabriel?”
There was no fear in her voice, only a deep, strong tone of tenderness that made the man more miserable still.
“I have something to say to you,” was his retort.
“Your wife—”
“No, not of her.”
“Then?”
“It is of ourselves, and therefore the sadder.”
He sprang up suddenly and began to move up and down before her, like one who would rouse his courage and deaden the consciousness of pain. Joan watched him, half bemused, her fingers opening and closing upon the rough woodwork of the seat. The mood was not new to her; she remembered with what an intonation he had spoken to her nigh a year ago beside the ruined altar on the hills.
“Joan!”