Page:What Maisie Knew (Chicago & New York, Herbert S. Stone & Co., 1897).djvu/428

414 window and up to the sky; she could hear him rattle in his trousers' pocket his money or his keys. "Yes—that 's what she keeps saying." It gave him for a moment an air that was almost helpless.

"You say you don't care about her," Maisie went on. "Do you mean you've quarrelled?"

"We do nothing in life but quarrel."

He rose before her, as he said this, so soft and fair, so rich, in spite of what might worry him, in restored familiarities, that it gave a bright blur to the meaning to what would otherwise, perhaps, have been the tangible promise of the words. "Oh, your quarrels!" she exclaimed with discouragement.

"I assure you hers are quite fearful!" he laughed.

"I don't speak of hers. I speak of yours."

"Ah, don't do it till I 've had my coffee! You're growing up clever," he added. Then he said: "I suppose you 've breakfasted?"

"Oh no—I 've had nothing."

"Nothing in your room"—he was all compunction. "My dear old man!—we'll