'And do, do let's be happy. It's your birthday----' 'As though I've forgotten that.' He looked at her upturned face; her arm was round his neck now. 'Lucy, I don't believe you understand my love for you,' he said solemnly. 'No,' said Lucy truthfully, 'I don't think I do.' 'You'll have to learn.' 'Yes,' said Lucy; and sighed faintly. 'You mustn't wound such love.' 'No,' said Lucy. 'Don't let us wound each other ever any more, darling Everard.' 'I'm not talking of each other. I'm talking at this moment of myself in relation to you. One thing at a time, please.' 'Yes,' said Lucy. 'Kiss me, won't you, Everard? Else I shan't know we're really friends.' He took her head in his hands, and bestowed a solemn kiss of pardon on her brow. She tried to coax him back to cheerfulness. 'Kiss my eyes too,' she said, smiling at him, 'or they'll feel neglected.' He kissed her eyes. 'And now my mouth, please, Everard.' He kissed her mouth, and did at last smile. 'And now won't we go to the fire and be cosy?' she asked, her arm in his. 'By the way, who ordered the fire?' he inquired in his ordinary voice. 'I don't know. It was lit when I came up. Oughtn't it to have been?' 'Not without orders. It must have been that Lizzie. I'll ring and find out----' 'Oh, don't ring!' exclaimed Lucy, catching his hand,--she felt she couldn't bear any more ringing. 'If you do she'll come, and I want us to be alone together.' 'Well, whose fault is it we haven't been alone together all this time?' he asked. 'Ah, but we're friends now--you mustn't go back to that any more,' she said, anxiously smiling and drawing his hand through her arm. He allowed her to lead him to the arm-chair, and sitting in it did at last feel justified in taking her on his knee. 'How my own Love spoils things,' he said, shaking his head at her with fond solemnity when they were settled in the chair. And Lucy, very cautious now, only said gently, 'But I never _mean_ to.' XXIII She sat after that without speaking on his knee, his arms round her, her head on his breast. She was thinking. Try as she might to empty herself of everything except acceptance and love, she found that only her body was controllable. That lay quite passive in Wemyss's arms; but her mind refused to lie passive, it would think. Strange how tightly one's body could be held, how close to somebody else's heart, and yet one wasn't anywhere near the holder. They locked you up in prisons that way, holding your body tight and thinking they had got you, and all the while your mind--you--was as free as the wind and the sunlight. She couldn't help it, she struggled hard to feel as she had felt when she woke up and saw him sitting near her; but the way he had refused to be friends, the complete absence of any readiness in him to meet her, not half, nor even a quarter, but a little bit of the way, had for the first time made her consciously afraid of him.