Page:Arthur Stringer - Twin Tales.djvu/258

248 took it, was passive, and she did not return his smile. Her face seemed preoccupied and pinched. Yet if she looked older, she looked none the less lovely to him.

"They know!"

She said it in little more than a whisper, as her eyes met his.

"Know what?" he had to ask, so intent was he on what the moment held for him.

"That we were together last night," she told him.

"And what does that mean?" he asked, surprised the next moment at her look of tragic intensity.

"It means, I suppose, that I at last have to act for myself. But I'd rather not talk about it now. The one thing I want is for you to come up and look over the pictures while we've still the chance."

"I'm ready," he said.

"We must go quietly," she warned him.

"Why?" he asked.

"Because this is one of the things in which I'm acting for myself," she said in the gloom of the hallway, once the door was shut behind him.