CHAPTER XII
“You? Is it you?” She seemed doubtful.
Gumbril nodded. “It’s me,” he reassured her. “I’ve shaved; that’s all.” He had left his beard in the top right-hand drawer of the chest of drawers, among the ties and the collars.
Emily looked at him judicially. “I like you better without it,” she decided at last. “You look nicer. Oh no, I don’t mean to say you weren’t nice before,” she hastened to add. “But—you know—gentler——” She hesitated. “It’s a silly word,” she said, “but there it is: sweeter.”
That was the unkindest cut of all. “Milder and more melancholy?” he suggested.
“Well, if you like to put it like that,” Emily agreed.
He took her hand and raised it to his lips. “I forgive you,” he said.
He could forgive her anything for the sake of those candid eyes, anything for the g
