CHAPTER XXIII
REBA didn't know just when the fraternal attitude of Dr. Booth toward her changed to something more significant. It was very gradual, and for a while, just as with Nathan, she wondered if she was manufacturing it, if he was conscious of any change himself. He was conscious of it, and fought it for a while. But not very persistently. It culminated one hot Saturday night at the end of a long afternoon together, when high, protecting rocks, and the long-continued, almost hypnotizing effect of a steadily-pounding surf seemed to draw them together—hide them away, and make them forget all conventionalities, all obligations outside their secluded crevice.
As frequently of late, Reba had been reading to Chadwick Booth in the early afternoon, out of a large, scientific-looking volume (Chadwick Booth was writing an article for a medical journal) and he had laughed, reached out, and squeezed her hand delightedly, two or three times, over her amusing pronunciations of unfamiliar technical words and phrases. He had, too, gently jibed her for blushing because he touched her hand.
"What if I should kiss you?" tauntingly he had flung at her once; and she, in that almost tragic voice she assumed sometimes, had exclaimed, "I wish you wouldn't talk to me like that."
"Proper little Miss New England!" he had thrust at her playfully.
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