"How've you been, little sister, while I've been wandering the gay white
way?" he asked.
"I've been all right, Leslie."
"Not quite all right, I think. Have you ever thought, Elizabeth, that no
man on earth is worth what you've been going through?"
"I'm all right, I tell you," she said impatiently. "I'm not grieving any
more. That's the truth, Les. I know now that he doesn't intend to come
back, and I don't care. I never even think about him, now."
"I see," he said. "Well, that's that."
But he had not counted on her intuition, and was startled to hear her
say: "Well? Go on."
"What do you mean, go on?"
"You brought me out here to tell me something."
"Not at all. I simply--"
"Where is he? You've seen him."
He tried to meet her eyes, failed, cursed himself for a fool. "He's
alive and well, Elizabeth. I saw him in New York." It was a full minute
before she spoke again, and then her lips were stiff and her voice
strained.
"Has he gone back to her? To the actress he used to care for?"
He hesitated, but he knew he would have to go on.
"I'm going to tell you something, Elizabeth. It's not very creditable
to me, but I'll have to trust you. I don't want to see you wasting your
life. You've got plenty of courage and a lot of spirit. And you've got
to forget him."
He told her, and then he took her home. He was a little frightened, for
there was something not like her in the way she had taken it, a sort of
immobility that might, he thought, cover heartbreak. But she smiled when
she thanked him, and went very calmly into the house.
That night she accepted Wallie Sayre.