“It’s because we love each other, dear heart, that we like being together! Oh, Rhoda, if you’d only admit--” She bent toward him with her sudden, flashing smile, that he had come to know as the signal of some equally sudden and unexpected face-about in her thought, and he stopped, expectant. “I do admit it, Jeff!” came to him demurely in the wake of the smile. “Rhoda!” he cried, and his whole being tried to leap toward her. But he had no more than lifted his head from the pillow than she sprang up with a cry of alarm, her hand thrust out to hold him back. “Jeff, you mustn’t!” she exclaimed, her face suddenly serious again and her voice all anxiety. “You’ll break that rib over again if you don’t lie still, and father says it’s knitting together so nicely!” In her alarm she had put one hand against his chest to push him back upon his pillow. Quickly his hand imprisoned it and held it against his heart. For a moment neither spoke and as she bent above him feeling his heart throb beneath her hand, looking down into his eyes and seeing love and longing there, response crept into her own and a warmer color into her cheeks. Unconsciously she bent nearer, swayed toward him, and he threw up both arms, sure that they would enclose her in the embrace for which they were longing. But realization flashed upon her and she sprang back. He held his empty arms toward her for a moment, then let them fall upon the bed. She could not bear the look upon his face and sank down into her chair, her own hidden in her hands. Presently she began gathering up her sewing, scattered upon the floor. “Rhoda,” he said humbly, “I beg your pardon!” She would not meet his eyes, but kept her own steadily upon her sewing, as she neatly folded it together. “It wasn’t your fault any more than mine,” she answered in subdued accents, “but it mustn’t happen again, or I shall have to stay out of here entirely. I must go now. Father is usually home by this time, and I always go to his office when he comes to see if he needs me for anything.” “But you’ll come back, dear, as soon as you can? And you’ll forgive me?” he begged. “Yes, I’ll come back, when I can, but I’ll be busy now, for a while. And I’ll forgive you--if you’ll forgive me!” She smiled at him, not the radiant flash which he loved, but just a tender curving of the lips which sent no merry light up into her serious eyes. “Rhoda! What a dear girl you are! Forgive you! You’ll come back soon?” “As soon as I can.” She turned at the door, still smiling gently, and held up at him a warning finger. “But you must promise not to talk about love!” “All right, Rhoda. If you won’t stay away long, I’ll promise--for next time!” Outside the door a trembling seized her and she leaned against the wall. “I didn’t give up,” she told herself, “I didn’t, that time. But could I--again?”