Page:The Star in the Window.pdf/284

274 "is on a boat that sails between places in the Pacific. That's why I don't know exactly where he is."

"Oh, that's it; that's it," murmured Aunt Augusta; but she was still mystified. So were the others.

"Was it a secret marriage?" the sharp, high voice of the invalid suddenly broke in.

Reba nodded. "Yes, and I meant to keep it secret till he came back, and we settled down somewhere."

"What made you change your mind, then?" Reba's mother asked. "Sudden, like this?"

For the first time Reba hesitated.

"Yes, what made you change your mind?" repeated the now-aroused David.

Reba's hands slipped down into her lap. Her eyes fixed themselves on the glass knob of a door across the room. She stared at it in silence, but it was not the knob she saw. Oh, how it hurt! Just to think of his eyes—how it hurt! She winced slightly.

"It isn't as if I were young," she said outloudout-loud [sic], in that strange dull voice of hers. "I'm too old to get over it—to wake up healed from it some day," mystifyingly to those who listened Reba went on. "I shall never feel the same toward life again. All the beauty has gone out of it now."

The invalid leaned forward in her chair.

"What are you talking about, Reba Jerome?" she called out shrilly.

Reba glanced at her mother unsurprised. What indeed was she talking about? And here, too? She gazed about at the staring faces, then shrugged and actually smiled. Never mind! She didn't care.

"I presume I was just thinking outloudout-loud [sic]," she said.