"Then I'll have to crawl in, too, won't I? But, alas, Jim! The three-word-classic is my limit. When father took me to Shanghai, I learned it--three hundred and fifty-six lines of it! But it's all the Chinese I know--except a stray phrase or two. Cheer up, dear; we won't have to look for our shadows on that hill."
Breakfast was soon accomplished; she looked shyly across at him; he nodded, and they rose.
"The question is," she said, "when am I going to find time to read the remainder of the morning paper, and keep myself properly informed from day to day, if you make breakfast so agreeable for me?"
"You know you have," she said lightly. "Suppose you read the paper aloud to me, while I stroll about for the sake of my figure."
They laughed; he picked up the paper and began to read the headlines, and she walked about the room, her hands bracketed on her hips, listening sometimes, sometimes absorbed in her own reflections, now and then glancing out of the window or pausing to rearrange a bowl of flowers.
Little by little, however, her leisurely progress from one point of interest to another became more haphazard, and she moved restlessly, with a tendency to drift in his direction.
Perhaps she realised that, for she halted suddenly.
"Jim, I have enough of politics, thank you. And it's almost time to put on more conventional apparel, isn't it? I have a long and hard day before me at the office."
"As hard as yesterday?" he asked, unthinkingly; then reddened.
She had moved to the window as she spoke; but he had seen the quick, unconscious gesture of pain as her hand flew to her breast; and her smiling courage when she turned toward him did not deceive him.
"That _was_ a hard day, Jim. But I think the worst is over. And you may read your paper if you wish until I am ready. You have only to put on your business coat, haven't you?"
So he tried to fix his mind on the paper, and, failing, laid it aside and went to his room to make ready.
When he was prepared, he returned to their sitting room. She was not there, and the door of her bedroom was open and the window-curtains fluttering.
So he descended to the library, where he found her playing with his assortment of animals, a cat tucked under either arm and a yellow pup on her knees.