As she pulled one book forward and then another she thought ironically of her own certainty not an hour ago; how it had vanished in a moment, how she was merely marking time as best she could, not knowing in the least where they stood, what they felt, or whether William loved her or not.

More and more the condition of Mary's mind seemed to her wonderful and enviable--if, indeed, it could be quite as she figured it--if, indeed, simplicity existed for any one of the daughters of women.
"Swift," she said, at last, taking out a volume at haphazard to settle this question at least.

"Let us have some Swift." Rodney took the book, held it in front of him, inserted one finger between the pages, but said nothing.

His face wore a queer expression of deliberation, as if he were weighing one thing with another, and would not say anything until his mind were made up.
Katharine, taking her chair beside him, noted his silence and looked at him with sudden apprehension.

What she hoped or feared, she could not have said; a most irrational and indefensible desire for some assurance of his affection was, perhaps, uppermost in her mind.