Well. That spoke volumes. She had doubted his loyalty, even if only for a moment. And why shouldn't she? She had good reason. And perhaps it was some sort of retribution from her Barge self, a repayment of his doubts about her.

Without comment, he tapped the side of his glass against the rim of hers with a satisfying clink - here's to that, then - and drained the contents once more. He set the empty tumbler aside, deciding in a peripheral sort of way that he had had quite enough in such a short period of time.

"You know, two days before our wedding, your mother, frightful harridan that she is, insisted you stay with her the night before." Storytelling, quiet and thoughtful. Another way to distract her, another way to pass the time. "We had such a row over it, Martha. You can imagine, I'm certain. Each of us in turn said things I won't repeat for the sake of keeping the peace. In the end, I nearly walked out, and I think you nearly let me."

"I made it to the door, had the blasted thing open, and - I thought, quite suddenly, the way one does when one has a very ugly epiphany, 'What if she isn't here when I come back?'" Not if he came back. When. It had seemed so certain then that he would, in spite of his ire. "'What if she isn't waiting for me to come around?'"

He paused there to let her think it over for a moment.

"Tonight, I nearly left again," he went on finally. He avoided meeting her eyes as he spoke, though his expression suggested he was more pensive than ashamed. "I spent so long thinking how I would react if I ever could see her again - just for an hour, perhaps, or even a moment or two - that I didn't think at all. Until I remembered that fear, of course, that you might not be here when I came back."

'When'. Not 'if'.

He shot a glance at her and added, "I didn't leave back then, either, by the by."