“Impatient—it is hardly the word. I long to be out in the world again. I could never have endured the long seclusion but for my work over these drawings and my thoughts of you.”
“Why me?”
“I have felt that I am doing the best for your sake as well as my own. I would not have had you subjected to the vulgar gaze of a crowded court room—not for worlds. The very thought that I have saved you from that has made me contented with my enforced idleness.”
“Not idleness,” she said, tapping the roll of drawings with the toe of her shoe.
“Well, no, not idleness exactly.”
“And I do hope you’ll win the prize,” she added, looking up into his eyes.
“So do I. But perhaps you don’t know what I count to be the real prize.”
