Page:Middle Aged Love Stories (IA middleagedlove00bacorich).djvu/105

 direct as a boy’s, left his, he looked long at the closed door, wondering at the quickening of his pulses.

A moment later he heard her voice, imperious and clear, and the mumble of Mr. Waters’s unavailing if never-ending excuses. He laughed softly to himself, and touched the strings of the guitar that she had struck. “I shall save the worthy Thomas much,” he murmured to himself, “and of course I do it to reform her—I cannot pull down the village and die with the Philistines!”

She went up the long main street, Mr. Waters at her side and Annabel Riley behind her. Her lodger watched her out of sight, and prepared to lock up the Rooms.

“So firm, so positive, so wholesome!” he said, as he started after her.