Without a word he took up the two old china candlesticks, and
held them, one in each lank-fingered hand, before his face, and
turned.

Lawford could see his wife--every tint and curve and line as
distinctly as she could see him. Her cheeks never had much
colour; now her whole face visibly darkened, from pallor to a
dusky leaden grey, as she gazed. It was not an illusion then; not
a miserable hallucination. The unbelievable, the inconceivable,
had happened. He replaced the candles with trembling fingers and
sat down.

'Well,' he said, 'what is it really; what is it really, Sheila?
What on earth are we to do?'

'Is the door locked?' she whispered. He nodded. With eyes fixed
stirlessly on his face, Sheila unsteadily seated herself, a
little out of the candlelight, in the shadow. Lawford rose and
put the key of the door on his wife's little rose-wood
prayer-desk at her elbow, and deliberately sat down again.

'You said "a fit"--where?'

'I suppose--is--is it very different--hopeless? You will
understand my being... O Sheila, what am I to do?' His wife sat
perfectly still, watching him with unflinching attention.

'You gave me to understand--"a nervous fit"; where?'