Under False Pretences

Percival threw down his serviette and started up to meet her. And then he knew why his father and sister looked uncomfortable. Elizabeth was changed; it was plain enough that Elizabeth must be ill. She was thinner than he had ever seen her, and her face had grown pale. But the fixed gravity and mournfulness of her expression struck him even more than the sharpened contour of her features or the dark lines beneath her eyes. She looked as if she suffered: as if she was suffering still.