ou and me."

"You see, it leads nowhere," said she.

"Doesn't it?" said he.

The little room in the Cliff-side was whiter than ever, burning white,
it was, where the sun faced it. But the east side of it was in shadow,
and they sat there, under the great forehead of the Cliff.

They were both silent. Lucy was thinking of how he had found her there,
and of the fear and trouble of last night. He vowed that if he could
help it there should be no more fear and no more trouble for her. In
their silence, voices thin and sweet with distance, came to them from
below, where children played on the beach among the rocks that, washed
by water-springs from the Cliff's forehead to its foot, lay heaped where
they had fallen. She listened and laughed.

She was happy now. He watched her as she stretched her adorable feet to
the sun. A little wind came from the sea and played with her, taking
from her a slight scent of violets for its salt. Every nerve in his body
was aware of her nearness.

Only last night he had seen her crouching just there, in the darkness,
convulsed, her face wet with rain and tears. It was good that the place
they had chosen should be changed and cleansed for them by sunlight and
wind from the sea and the sweet voices of children.

She did not break the silence. She only looked at him once with eyes
whose pupils, black and dilated, narrowed the blue ring of the iris.

Then he spoke. "I was going to say something to you last night, but I
didn't. There was something I wanted to know first, something I wasn't
quite sure about."

She turned her face from him. The light struck it, and it quivered and
grew white.

"Well, do you know now?"

"Yes," he said, "I know now."

But her lips scarcely moved as she answered him. "Of course you know."

She faced him with her sad white courage.

"Everybody knows. I'd rather you knew. I--I meant you to."

"Oh please"--he protested. "I wonder if I may say what it is?"

"It's something about me?"

"Yes. It's something about you. If I may say it."

"You may say anything you please. You know that."

"Well, I wanted very much to know whether--whether you were fond of
children."

"Oh----" She drew a long breath, as if released from torture. Then she
laughed the indescribable half-sobbing laugh of a child tormented and
suddenly set free.

"Whether I were fond of children. Do you honestly mean it? Was that what
you weren't sure of?"

"Well, of course, in a way I k