But the
oil smears and the eyes that shone out from under the fair overhanging
brows were again almost too young. They made the strength pathetic.
He, too, sat in the sunlight, which was not kind to his green,
threadbare clothes. But the sun only came into the stable yard for an
hour or two, and as it withdrew itself slowly along the length of the
table he shifted his position to move with it, unconsciously, like a
tired animal. Francey, cross-legged and smoking, on the couch which at
night unfolded itself into a bed, saw the movement and smiled at him.
Her eyes were as steady in their serenity as his were steady with
hunger. She did not change colour, so that whatever she understood
from that long scrutiny did not trouble her. He leant forward, as
though he were afraid of missing some subtle half-tone in her voice.
"Mr. Ricardo thinks I'm unprejudiced. He's forgotten the times when he
pulled my ears and smacked my head. But you are different, Francey.
You can say what you think."
"But it wouldn't be at all helpful," she answered very solemnly. "To
begin with, I have the scientific mind, and I cannot accept as a basis
of argument an entirely untested hypothesis."
Connie Edwards thereupon gave vent to an artificial groan of anguish,
followed by an explosive giggle which would have lost her her half of
Rufus Cosgrave's chair had he not put his arm round her. There were
only three chairs in the room, and as two of them had been already
occupied when she and her companion had, as she expressed it, "blown
in" half an hour previously, they had perched together, listening with
clasped hands and an air of insincere solemnity.
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