He gave her a quick penetrating look, and then a whimsical smile crossed his face.
“Valerie Carr, this is a spring day. And I’d like another cup of tea.” But he thought of her remark many times in the next week or two.
Valerie carefully manœuvred herself out of the hammock and sat down at the tea-table.
Dane watched her, amused that it should delight him so much to have her raise the cream jug over his cup and watch him till he nodded “enough,” amused that he should find it so important to balance the hammock carefully while she got back beside him, and then so entertaining that they should drink sip by sip to each other, their eyes shining across the rims of those elegant red cups.
When Lee had taken the things away Dane insisted on music. For nearly two hours he lay listening to her, thinking it a wonderful thing that life could still make dreams come true, and anticipating the time when she would be there with him to play to him when he wanted her to.
Thinking of it he could even be philosophical about the fact that he had promised to have an early dinner and to run her afterwards in his launch to the Aratapu hospital to see Bob. He knew she would have preferred to stay with him, but he admired her all the more because she had not wavered for an instant about going.
II
It was the next Wednesday night before Valerie could take an hour to go out on the river with him again. She had had moments of regretting that they had not waited till the election was over. And then she told herself that
