which they had made for themselves, which was dim and sub-aqueous.[Pg 28] The foam and brightness was all perfectly sincere, for she was never other than sincere, but it had no more than the sincerity of soap-bubbles. [Pg 28] "No. I didn't come here to be polite," said Hugh, "though I didn't come here to be rude. I came to ask you a couple of questions." Nadine had lain down on the bed again, having put all the pillows behind her, so that she was propped up by them. Her arms were clasped behind her head, and the folds of her rainbow dressing-gown fell back from them leaving them bare nearly to the shoulder. The shaded light above her bed fell upon her hair, burnishing its gold, and her face below it was dim and suggested rather than outlined. The most accomplished of coquettes would, after thought, have chosen exactly that attitude and lighting, if she wanted to appear to the greatest advantage to a man who loved her, but Nadine had done it without motive. It may have been that it was an instinct with her to appear to the utmost advantage, but she would have done the same, without thought, if she was talking to a middle-aged dentist. Hugh had seated himself at some little distance from her, and the same light threw his face into strong line and vivid color. He had still something of the rosiness of youth about him, but none of youth's indeterminateness, and he looked older than his twenty-five years. When he was moving, he moved with a boy's quickness; when he sat still he sat with the steadiness of strong maturity. "You needn't ask them," she said. "I can answer[Pg 29] you without that. The answer to them both is that I don't know." [Pg 29] "How? Do you know the questions yet?" said he. "I do. You want to know whether my answer to you this evening is final. You want also to know why I don't say 'yes.'" His eyes admitted the correctness of this: he need not have spoken. "After all, there was not much divination wanted," he said. "I am as obvious as usual. And you understand me as well as usual." She shook her head at this, not denying it, but only deprecating it. "I always understand you too well," she said. "If only I didn't understand you, just as I don't understand Seymour, you have suggested a reason for why I don't say
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