"How did you get that?" he said.
His eyes looked straight into hers. There was something pitiless,
something almost brutal, in their regard. In spite of herself she
flinched, and lowered her own.
"Answer me!" he said.
She felt the hot colour rush in a guilty flood over her face. "It
was only--for once," she faltered. "I wanted sleep, and I couldn't
get it."
"Kieff gave it you," he said, his tone grimly insistent.
She nodded. "Yes. He meant well. He saw I was fagged out."
Burke was silent for a space, still grasping her hand. Her head
was throbbing dizzily, but she would not lower it to the pillow
again in his presence. She felt almost like a prisoner awaiting
sentence.
"Did he give it you against your will?" he asked at length.
"Not altogether." Her voice was almost a whisper. Her heart was
beating with hard, uneven strokes. She felt sick and faint.
Burke moved suddenly, releasing her hand. He rose with that
decision characteristic of him and walked across the room. She
heard the splash of water in a basin, and then he came back to her.
As if she had been a child, he raised her to lean against him, and
proceeded very quietly to bathe her face and head with ice-cold
water.
She shrank at the chill of it, but he persisted in his task, and
very soon she began to feel refreshed.
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