The piano is too
far off across the hall to be available; so that the little I can do in
that way doesn't count. I can--let me see, I can teach you three
solitaires, or play cribbage, or--I beg your pardon, I forgot."
"You forgot what?" he asked, so intent upon watching the sunlight
filtering through her hair that he had hardly noticed what she said.
She looked at him questioningly.
"You don't play cards, perhaps?" she said tentatively.
"No," he answered. "In the country in my boyhood they weren't held in
high repute, to say the least; and naturally we don't play at the
Clergy House."
There was a brief interval of silence, during which he watched her,
while she in her turn looked into the fire. When she spoke again it was
in a different tone.
"I know," said she, "that you must think me frivolous, and that I can't
be anything else; but"--
"Oh, no," he interrupted, "I never thought you frivolous."
She made an impulsive little gesture with one of her hands.
"Oh, you wouldn't put it in that way, I dare say. You'd call it being
worldly, I suppose; but it comes to much the same thing."
Wynne could not understand what was the direction of her thoughts, and
he was taken entirely by surprise when she leaned forward impulsively
and took in hers his free hand.
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