"
"There you are!" Julian burst out, with a relieved sigh, a more natural
colour creeping back to his face. "If Jim Beckett let you go before the
war without asking you to marry him, I'm afraid his love couldn't have
been very deep--not deep enough to make him forgive you after all this
time for deceiving his old father and mother the way you have. My God,
no! In spite of your beauty, he'd have no mercy on you!"
"That's what I think," I said. "My having met him, and his loving me a
little, makes what I've done more shameful than if I'd never met him at
all."
"Then you see why you must get away as quick as you can!" urged Julian,
his eyes lighting as he drew nearer to me on the garden bench. "Oh,
wait, don't speak yet! Let me explain my plan. There's time still.
You're thinking of Brian before yourself, maybe. But he's safe. The
Becketts adore him. They say he 'saved their reason.' He makes the
mysticism they're always groping for seem real as their daily bread. He
puts local colour into the fourth dimension for them! They can never do
without Brian again. All that's needed is for him to propose to Dierdre.
I know--you think he won't, no matter how he feels. But he'll have
missed her while he's away. She's a missable little thing to any one who
likes her, and she can tempt him to speak out in spite of himself when
he gets back. I'll see to it that she does. The Becketts will be
enchanted. The old lady's a born match-maker.
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