he was laughing Viola came in. She had Jevons with her.

It was evident that neither of them was prepared for Reggie Thesiger.
They had let themselves in with a latch-key and come straight upstairs
without encountering Mrs. Pavitt.

At the sight of her brother Viola betrayed a feeling I should not have
believed possible to her. For the first and I may say the last, time in
my experience of her, I saw Viola show funk.

It was the merest tremor of her tilted mouth, the flicker of an eyelash,
an almost invisible veiling of her brilliant eyes; I do not think it
would have been perceptible to anybody who watched her with a less tense
anxiety than mine. But it was there, and it hurt me to see it.

There was one person, only one person, in the world whom Viola was
afraid of, and that was her brother Reggie. She was afraid of him because
she loved him. He was the person in the world that she loved best,
before--before the catastrophe. And this fear of hers that I alone saw
(Reggie most certainly had not seen it) ought to have warned me if
nothing else had.

It probably would have warned me but for what she did next; but for her
whole subsequent behaviour.

She broke loose from Reggie, who had closed on her with a shout of
"Hallo, Vee-Vee!" and an embrace; she broke loose from Reggie and turned
to me, all laughing and rosy from his impact, with an outstretched hand
and a voice that swept to me and rippled with a sort of nervous joy. And
she said: "Oh, Wally, this _is_ nice of you! You'll stop for tea."

Her mouth said that. But her eyes--they had grown suddenly pathetic--said
a lot more. They said: "Don't go, Wally, _please_ don't go. Whatever you
do, don't leave me alone with him." At least, I can see now that that's
what they were saying. And even at the time I saw on her dear face the
same blessed relief (at finding me there) that I had seen on Reggie's.

Neither Reggie nor I, mind you, had seen Jevons yet (I am speaking of
fractions of seconds of time); and he wasn't actually in the room; but
Viola and I were aware of him outside. If he had not paused on the
landing to dispose of his overcoat and his hat and his stick, their
entrance would have been simultaneous.

That pause saved them.

His stick slipped and tumbled down on the landing with a clatter. We
heard him prop it up again. Our eyes met. I'm afraid mine said: "What are
you going to do _now_?"

Then he came in and I saw the gallant Reggie take the shock