'Can you give me half an hour or so ?' She answered, 'Certainly,' laying down her pen, and leaning back in her chair.
'Your letters aren't important?
I may keep you for a longish time.
Perhaps we might put it off till the afternoon ?' 'They aren't in the least important.

You may keep me as long as you like.' 'Thanks.

Have a cigarette ?' He offered his case, and Helen took one and lighted it at the match he held for her, and then Gerald, lighting his own, proceeded to stroll up and down the room reflecting.
'Helen,' he began, 'I've been thinking things over.' His tone was serene, yet a little inquiring.

He might have been thinking over some rather uncertain investment, or the planning of a rather exacting trip abroad.

Yet Helen's intuition leaped at once to deeper significances.
Looking out of the window at the lawn, bleached with dew, the trees, the distant autumnal uplands, while she quietly smoked her cigarette, it was as if her sub-consciousness, aroused and vigilant, held its breath, waiting.
'You know,' said Gerald, 'what I've always really wanted to do more than anything else.