"Are you feeling he'll never come?"

"I'm sure he'll come."

"Well then--"

"Perhaps it's the wind," Helen said. "You're very good to me."

"Oh, I'm fond of you," Lily said.

"Are you fond enough to kiss me?" Helen asked. She wanted a touch at which she need not shudder, and surely it was fitting that some one should kiss her on her wedding-day.

CHAPTER x.x.x

Soon after nine o'clock, Helen bade Mildred Caniper and the nurse good-night and went downstairs with Jim close at her heels.

"We're going to sit in the kitchen, James. I'll get my sewing."

She hesitated at the window: the night was very dark, but she could see the violent swaying of the poplars, and she thought the thickening of their twigs was plain and, though it was April already, it was going to snow. She touched the ta.s.sel of the blind, but she did not pull on it, for she would not anger George with little things, and she left the window bare for his eyes and the night's.

"Keep close to me, Jim," she said as she sat and sewed, and she stroked him with a foot. She could hear no sound but the raging wind, and when the back door was opened she was startled.

"It's me," George said as he entered.

"I didn't hear you coming."

"I've been looking through the window for a long time." He went to the fireside. "Didn't you know? I hoped you'd be looking out for me, but you weren't anxious enough for that."

"Anxious?"

"Well--eager."

"Of course I wasn't. Why should I be?"

"You're my wife--and wives--"

"You know why I married you, George."

"You're married, none the less."

"I'm not disputing that."

"I suppose you despise me for--getting what I wanted."

"I only wonder if it was worth while."

"I'll make it that."

"But you won't know until your life is over, until lots of lives are over."

"I'll get what I can now."

She nodded lightly, and her coolness warmed him.

"Helen--"

"Why don't you sit down?"

"I don't know. I wish you wouldn't sew."

Without a word, she folded her work and gave it to him, and when he had put it down he knelt beside her, holding the arms of the chair so that he fenced her in.

"You don't understand, you can't understand that night's work," he said.

"I want to tell you. You--you were like an angel coming down into the racket. You took away my strength. I wanted you. I forgot about Miriam.

If I'd only known it, I'd been forgetting her every day when I saw you walking with the dog. You think I was just a beast, but I tell you--"

"I don't think that. I can't explain unless you give me room. Thank you.

You were a beast with Miriam, not with me."

He sat stiffly on his chair and murmured, "That's just it. And now, you see--"

"Yes, I do."

"But you don't like me."

"I might."

"You shall, by G.o.d!" He seemed to smoulder.

"I hope so," she said quietly, and damped the glow.

"You'll let me come here every night and sit with you?"

"Yes."

"And Mrs. Caniper, can she hear?"

"No, she is in the front of the house."

"And Jim won't mind?"

"Oh, no, Jim won't."

"Nor you?"

"You can get the big old chair from the schoolroom and bring it here.