With her hands in his, seeking no more to move her or convince her, he sat silent; and by mute looks and dumb love--more potent than eloquence or oratory--strove to support and console her.
She, too, was silent.

Stillness had fallen on both of them.

But her hands clung to his, and now and again pressed them convulsively; and now and again, too, she would lift her eyes to his, and gaze at him with a pathetic intentness, as if she would stamp his likeness on her brain.
But when he returned the look, and tried to read her meaning in her eyes, she smiled.

"You are afraid of me ?" she whispered.

"No, I shall not be weak again." But even as she reassured him he detected a flicker of pain in her eyes, he felt that her hands were cold; and but that he feared to shake her composure he would not have rested content with her answer.
This sudden silence, this new way of looking at him, were the only things that perplexed him.