The chilled blueness of her skin struck him as he scrutinized her. He touched her hand, automatically and impersonally, for confirmation of his impression.
“You’re frozen!” he said. His accent of ill-humour rang oddly familiar in his own ears. It was the old annoyance at yet another of the impulsive follies so typical of her. “What are you thinking of, to come out like this?” he added, sharply. “Here!” He flung open the study door. “There’s a fire here--sit down and warm yourself!” The tone of unsympathetic authority was--he remembered it--instinctively just the old tone he had so often used to her in that life now so remote as almost to seem a previous existence.
She opened her eyes again, the large emotional eyes that had not changed, looked at him, looked _into him_. Incredulity spread over her face.
“By your fire? Can you, Harry?--Can you, after everything--after all these years--can you still have me by your fire?”
Tears came up in those big eyes which looked so yearningly into his, and her mouth twisted itself into a pathetic little smile--the ghost of the smile that he had known in a younger face. He felt oddly uncomfortable.
“Come along!” He commanded her almost brutally, defending himself from any relaxation of hostility. “Come and warm yourself!” He lifted one of her hands and its chill struck to the centre of him. “Why have you no coat?--You must be mad!”
She smiled at him, and did not answer. He drew her into the warm study, pulled a chair close to the fire for her, pressed her down into it. Then he turned to switch on the full lights.
“Please, Harry!--Just like this--in the firelight.”
He obeyed and returned to her. Coldness seemed to emanate from her body as he came close. What sheer insanity! She must be chilled through and through, he thought.
He shrugged his shoulders to himself, disclaiming responsibility, and, for his own self-respect, played the host.
“Can I get you anything, Christine?” he asked, ungraciously. “Anything to eat or drink?”
She lifted her large eyes toward his face and shook her head slowly, without a word.
Baffled by her manner, he struck at what he thought to be the heart of the awkward situation.
“What do you want? What have you come for?” he demanded, harshly. “Money?”