'
He moved, but still delayed his offer to take leave.
'You said just now,' Clara continued, falteringly, 'that you did not
try to express sympathy, because words seemed of no use. How am I to
find words of thanks to you for coming here and listening to what I
had to say?'
'But surely so simple an act of friendship--'
'Have I so many friends? And what right have I to look to you for an
act of kindness? Did I merit it by my words when I last--'
There came a marvellous change--a change such as it needed either
exquisite feeling or the genius of simulation to express by means so
simple. Unable to show him by a smile, by a light in her eyes, what
mood had come upon her, what subtle shifting in the direction of her
thought had checked her words--by her mere movement as she stepped
lightly towards him, by the carriage of her head, by her hands half
held out and half drawn back again, she prepared him for what she
was about to say. No piece of acting was ever more delicately
finished. He knew that she smiled, though nothing of her face was
visible; he knew that her look was one of diffident, half-blushing
pleasure. And then came the sweetness of her accents, timorous,
joyful, scarcely to be recognised as the voice which an instant ago
had trembled sadly in self-reproach.
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