Lawford returned to the door and listened. It seemed he heard a voice talking downstairs, and yet not talking, for it ran on and on in an incessant slightly argumentative monotony that had neither break nor interruption. He closed the door, and stooping laid his hand softly on Alice’s narrow, still childish hand that lay half-folded on her knee. Her eyes opened instantly and gazed widely into his face. A slow vacant smile of sleep came and went and her fingers tightened gently over his as again her lids drooped down over the drowsy blue eyes. ‘At last, at last, dear,’ she said; ‘I have been waiting such a time. But we mustn’t talk much. Mother is waiting up, reading.’ Faintly through the close-shut door came the sound of that distant expressionless voice monotonously rising and falling. ‘Why didn’t you tell me, dear?’ Alice still sleepily whispered. ‘Would I have asked a single question? How could I? Oh, if you had only trusted me!’ ‘But the change—the change, Alice! You must have seen that. You spoke to me, you did think I was only a stranger; and even when you knew, it was only fear on your face, dearest, and aversion; and you turned to your mother first. Don’t think, Alice, that I am...God only knows—I’m not complaining. But truth is best whatever it is. I do feel that. You mustn’t be afraid of hurting me, my dear.’ Her very hands seemed to quicken in his as now, with sleep quite gone, the fret of memory returned, and she must reassure both herself and him. ‘But you see, dear, mother had told me that you—besides, I did know you at once, really; quite inside, you know, deep down. I know I was perplexed; I didn’t understand; but that was all. Why, even when you came up in the dark, and we talked—if you only knew how miserable I had been—though I knew even then there was something different, still I was not a bit afraid. Was I? And shouldn’t I have been afraid, horribly afraid, if _you_ had not been _you?_’ She repressed a little shudder, and clasped his hand more closely. ‘Don’t let us say anything more about it, she implored him; ‘we are just together again, you and I; that is all that matters.’ But her words were like brave soldiers who have fought their way through an ambuscade but have left all confidence behind them. Lawford listened; and that was enough just now—that she still, in spite of doubt, believed in him, and thought and cared for him. He was too tired to have refused the least kindness. He made no answer, but leant his head on the cool, slender fingers in gratitude and peace. And, just as he was, he almost instantly fell asleep. He woke in the darkness to find himself alone. He groped his way heavily to the door and turned the handle. But now it was really locked. Energy failed him. ‘I suppose—Sheila...’ he muttered. CHAPTER FOURTEEN