Chapter VI

" IT'S not going to leave off," said Nevill despairingly, drumming with his fingers on the window-pane, and looking out upon the little gardens below the flat. The rain was falling heavily, like rods, from a dreary sky.

He had lunched with the Bessingtons before going down to Ranelagh, as had been arranged, with Lord Maresfield, who was to call for them at half-past two and be taken down in Nevill's car. But the rain had set in with thunder about eleven; and it had rained steadily ever since. It did not seem probable that there would be polo this afternoon.

" Don't be so dismal, please," said Enid from her chair.

They had had a delightful lunch. Mrs. Bessington had managed her conversation quite tolerably; had made an excuse to go away as soon as coffee had come in; and had not returned. Nevill understood that she was making preparations of a private and intimate nature, probably domestic.

Enid had been as charming as ever since Saturday. She appeared entirely to have forgotten the very small misunderstanding they had somehow stumbled into; and it was now Wednesday. But it was Nevill now who felt himself at fault; he felt clumsy and awkward and rather gross, and he could not think why; he had never been particularly aware of these shortcomings before: he supposed it was that he had never before been on these intimate and tender terms with a woman. He had begun, too, more than ever now, to think that it really must have been himself who was to blame for the incident of last Saturday: he had been imperceptive, he told himself; he had jarred, somehow, on the fine femininity of the girl: and, above all, he had been a great deal too quick, during his little lonely walk in the park, to put the blame upon her and to see significance in what was insignificant. He had done her an injustice; he must take care to do her more than justice now, to make up.

" I'm sorry," he said, with a genial frankness. " I know I'm dismal. I hate being put off. What are you looking at? "

She held up a magazine, and then laid it aside. Again he felt clumsy: he had interrupted her.

" No, go on reading," he said. " I'll look at the rain. Perhaps it'll stop if I look hard enough — like a watched pot, you know."

He turned again to the window and began to ruminate.

Now, down at Hartley he would go and play tennis with a marker on such a day as this. Here there was really nothing whatever to do. Of course, there was a court at Prince's; but Enid wouldn't care to go merely to watch him. Besides, the court would certainly be taken. He was a discontented brute, he told himself. Yet he really did not know what to suggest; he would have been simply delighted to sit here with Enid, or to go to any form of entertainment that she wished; honestly he asked nothing better. He loved to watch her, to talk of nothing in particular, merely to be with her. But he felt she wanted something else; and he did not know what this was. He could not have believed, six months ago, that any human woman could so engage his attention, could so identify herself witH him that he judged of things from her view rather than from his own. He did not say any more "What should I like?" but "What should we like?"; in fact, it was very nearly, if not quite, " What would she like?"

The telephone-bell tingled in the little hall outside, and he turned round. Enid had not taken up the magazine again, and seemed ruminating too. Again he felt himself a brute: she had laid aside the magazine in order to be talked to, and he had not spoken. But she smiled naturally at him.

" Do go and see, there's a good boy! "

He went obediently out.

" It's Maresfield," he said, when he came back. " He says he's certain there'll be no polo; what? — and that the thing had better be off, eh? "

She smiled; but he felt he had been a little untactful in imitating her friend.

" Yes, I suppose so," she said. " Just tell him so, won't you; and then we'll see what's to be done."

An idea had come to him; and he proposed it as soon as he returned.

" What about the Zoo? " he asked. " I haven't been there since I took Jim. Let's go and be ridiculous "

Her forehead wrinkled slightly.

" Oh! do you think, in the rain? "

What an ass he was! Of course — the rain!

" Well, I give up. What a desolate hole London is! "

He sat down; for about the fifth time since lunch seeing that he had said what he should not; since he was in London simply because she was there. Again she smiled; but he felt he had wounded her again. How extraordinarily clumsy he was! Yet he used not to feel so with her; he had been even less careful than he was now trying to be, and yet somehow he had not said so many unfortunate things as he was saying now, in spite of his anxiety.

Then he yawned.

She looked at him; and then humour broke out all over her face.

" You're being quite impossible," she said. " First you don't talk; then you imitate that poor, dear man; then you say London's a desolate hole; and then you yawn in my face. Nevill, wake up! "

She said it so genially that the shadow went from his mind. (It was not till a little later that it occurred to him how rapidly she had narrated his blunders.)

" I know," he said. " But what's to be done? "

" What about a matinee? "

" My dear girl — anything in the world you like; but "

"I quite understand. Yes; we have been a good deal. Well; it's your turn."

" Let's get into a car and drive and drive; and then come home again to tea. We've got that beastly crush this evening, you know."

She stood up.

" Nevill; that's perfect! You'll drive, won't you; and — yes, that's perfect."

In ten minutes she was back again muffled up in a suitable manner. He put the difficulty that had occurred to him as soon as she had left the room.

" But what about your mother? " he said.

" Oh; mother won't come," she said lightly. " I saw her just now. Come on, Nevill. This is going to be lovely."

The car was already there, hooded against the rain; and Paul was waiting in the hall of the flat.

" We aren't going to Ranelagh," said Nevill. " You'll have to go inside, Paul. Miss Bessington will sit with me."

Ah! This thought had indeed been an inspiration. This was exactly what he wanted. He really had had more than enough of the inside of theatres, and galleries, and houses. It was that that was the matter with him, and that had put him slightly on edge. It was the open air and room to breathe, and a sense of space that he needed, and that she needed too.

" Now this is really nice," she said, as he finished tucking her in on the side nearest to himself, and as Paul went round in front to wind up the machine. "We'll just drive and drive, and come back to tea, as you said. Nevill, you're a genius! And I've never sat by you before, while you drove. Where shall we go? "

He proposed a route. They would start to the north, go as far as the time allowed, wheel westwards, and come back by Roehampton and Barnes and Hammersmith.

" That'll be lovely," she said contentedly.

Oh; but this was delicious to Nevill! There they sat, these two, in the world and simultaneously entirely out of it. That world streamed past them; first the crowded streets, then a scrap of open ground, then streets again; and at last would come the open country; they could observe and talk, shut in here, not only from the rain and the desolation outside, but from that pressing, talking world that had so crushed upon the nerves of them both. It was as if Frascati itself, or the seat by the horse's monument at Hartley, were translated into other terms. She was close beside him, that extraordinarily sweet presence; her face turned a little towards him, nestling in its hood; he saw it now and again when he could take his eyes off the road; but he was aware of it all the time. Moreover, their talking could be of the right sort: each could speak when inclined; or be silent — that very essential secret of comradeship. It was all exactly right.

" Oh! take care of that old man! " she said suddenly, as they whisked up by the side of the Park railings.

He was a first-rate example of the type abhorred of motorists' souls; he came out suddenly, thirty yards ahead, looking the wrong way; he set himself, with an open umbrella over his shoulder, with his back to them, irresolute, watching the opposite stream of vehicles, with a view, it appeared, to crossing.

Nevill set his teeth and turned the wheel a little, first sounding his horn; but the old gentleman paid no attention.

Five seconds later the car whisked by the old gentleman, sounding its horn suddenly again as it came opposite him, so soon as it was quite clear that he was perfectly safe. Enid caught an anguished face of terror.

" That'll teach him," said Nevill. " Those are the real road-hogs, after all."

Enid laughed softly.

" You're a little hard on him," she said.

" Not at all. We really have some right to the road, you know."

" You do drive splendidly," she said, as Nevill, after an anxious second or two at the Marble Arch, nipped in front of a heavy dray, whose driver was obviously trying to incommode him.

" Anfl that's another lesson," said Nevill. " What philanthropists we are! "

So they talked, easily, with silences; until, after leaving Edgware when the open country was certain, he turned to her.

" Now talk to me gently," he said, " and I'll put in comments."

"About what?"

" About anything in the world that you like."

She was silent for perhaps fifty yards.

"Well, I'll tell you what I want," she said.— " OK, Nevill! this is delicious! "

" Go on," he said. And his own heart warmed at her words. Then she began; and talked slowly and meditatively, with pauses.

" First of all," she said, " I want to live at Hartley for ever and ever. That's essential. Then I hardly ever want any guests: I want to feel that it's all mine — and yours of course. I want to be able to walk about the garden without being interrupted.... In summer I want all the windows opened wide all the time; and in winter I want all the curtains drawn, and the shutters shut, just before it gets quite dark. I think I want to go abroad about once in two years; at least, I think we ought to, or we may just possibly get stuffy."

" In spite of the open windows? "

" In spite of the open windows," she repeated gravely. " And I think in the other years we ought to come up to... to the desolate hole called London, for about a month — not more — for the same reason. Yes, I know that's very sensible and improving of me; but I can't help it.

" About guests.... Yes; I do want guests, one at a time, first a man and then a woman, and so on, alternately. I'll ask the women and you shall ask the men. But not too many."

" No married people? "

" No/' she said firmly. " And each of us is' responsible for his own guest, and must look after him. You can go down and bathe, or whatever it is, with your man; and... and I can sit out in the pavilion and talk Life and Being with my woman — or... or drive in a little pony-carriage with a fat pony. Nevill, I must have a fat pony; and then I can go and call on the clergyman's wife now and then."

" There'll be no difficulty about that, I should think. And we must have Aunt Anna, you know."

" Why, of course; that's understood."

"And your mother."

" Of course again," said Enid.

There was a very short pause before she began again.

" I shall wear nice clothes at Hartley. I think that's important. Nevill, have you got to do many county things?"

" Oh! now and then."

" Yes, I suppose so. And I suppose I must, too. What a pity! How very much nicer it would be not to do any of them.... Nevill."

"Yes?"

" Does Father Richardson really interrupt much? "

" My dear, he's got to be there, you know. Or someone else."

" I suppose so.... Oh, dear me! "

"What's the matter?"

" How heavenly it would be if we really could do exactly as we wanted!... without any conventions at all. What do you want? "

" I want exactly what you do."

" But how nice of you...! And there's really no chance at all of getting rid of Father Richardson? "

"It's like this," said Nevill. "Hartley is a Catholic place. It's been so always. There's always been a chapel there, which serves as a parish church. And where there's a chapel, there must be a chaplain. I suppose I could build a church in the village, instead; but it would be frightfully inconvenient for everybody else; and I can't think what people would say! "

" Does that matter? "

" I think it does, rather. You see, Hartley — the house itself — has always been a centre."

" I see," said Enid.

" Go on about other things," said Nevill. " We'll talk about Father Richardson later. Perhaps we could manage something."

So she went on, after another inconsiderable pause, describing in a delightful and inconsequent way, as if they were the dreams of a child, all the things that she wanted to do; and Nevill's heart again warmed and kindled to hear how she wanted a small walled garden down by the bridge, where she could sit entirely alone, to which she and Nevill alone had the key — and as an afterthought, the gardener too, when Nevill reminded her of the necessity — and a room at the top of the house, to which she alone had the key. Nevill might have another room like it, if he wished, under parallel conditions.

For he found in her again, as she talked, exactly the same mood and aspect in which he had first learned to love her — that strange and arresting love of solitude which he, too, secretly understood! that particular kind of attitude to the world of which they had spoken at Frascati, with the Campagna spread beneath them and the white line of Rome on the hazy horizon. He really had had some bad moments since Saturday, when he had actually almost believed that she was not quite what he had thought her — a belief which he had veiled to himself by saying that she had " nerves " — moments when she seemed, not indeed like other people after all (for evidently she was unique), but to possess characteristics of other people which he had not imagined her to possess. But those moments were gone now, once and for all; and the balance was restored. He knew now that he had been right at first; that all the comradeship was there, just as he had thought; that she was not only the woman that he loved, but (what does not always follow) the woman that he understood. So peace came back; and he was as happy as ever.

Ill

The rain had stopped; and it was after four o'clock — for she looked at her wrist-watch as they left Roehampton Lane — when they approached the steep bridge that passes over the railway line immediately above Barnes Station.

Nevill drove superbly; there had been no more philanthropic lessons bestowed gratis upon the passers-by. Everyone had behaved well, and the car best of all. He had settled down long ago into that instinctive rhythmical mood of the driver who knows his car and his own powers, who acts from that trained subconscious attention which must be formed into a habit before a man is perfectly competent.

As they swung up the steep ascent of the bridge — so steep that a pedestrian coming up the other side is bound to be invisible to the driver of a low car until the two almost meet — Nevill became aware of a toppling motor-omnibus in front, just beyond the crown of the bridge, going the same way as himself. He turned the wheel a little to the right, so as to be able to pass it if the road should prove to be empty when he had topped the rise.

Exactly as he swept up to it, a perambulator, pushed by a small girl, with a baby in it, became suddenly visible just over the top.

Nevill had the car entirely under control; but he had very nearly the full power on to take him up the steep; and his hand fortunately was already in place to shut it off. He did so, automatically, and put down the brakes.

All would have been perfectly right if the girl with the perambulator had remained where she was, or crossed over. He would have kept his line slightly to the left and behind the omnibus in one case; or held straight on, in the other. Nothing could have happened. But she did precisely the one thing that made some kind of an accident inevitable. She pushed the perambulator in a panic behind the omnibus; she let go of the handles; and she herself remained where she was.

Nevill had one fraction of a second to decide what he would do. If he kept to the left he would strike the perambulator; if he kept to the right he would probably, but not certainly, strike the girl. He kept to the right; there was simply not time for the brakes entirely to check the car; and with a horrible tightening of his heart he saw that, although the girl sprang away with a scream, she was still in front of the car. Then she fell, whether actually struck or not by the off wheel of the motor, he was unable to be sure.

The car stopped.

There fell on Nevill, for one second, a complete paralysis. He knew that he had done the only possible thing; that he was within the speed-limit; that the car was under control; that he had not been guilty of even the slightest rashness. But it was his first accident; and there lay the child, screaming.

Then Paul was out, and running past. Then, as he turned without a word to Enid, she, too, flung off the rugs herself without a word, and sprang out. Nevill backed his car a little, turned, slid by the derelict perambulator, and came to rest clear of the bridge. Then, still sickened at heart, yet knowing that at least there could be no question of loss of life, and scarcely even of injury, he too climbed out of his seat and walked back.

There seemed singularly few people about — owing, probably, to the recent rain. The omnibus had gone on its way; though he had seen figures on the top of it turn and look back. A couple of women, at a distance, turned and stared, horrified; a boy ran up, excited and pleased. A man on the common below seemed to be gazing up with interest. And that was all, except for the little group on the crown of the bridge.

As he came up to them he saw that the girl was already lifted to her feet and had ceased screaming. Paul was hurriedly brushing her down as well as he could: Enid was holding her round the shoulders. The girl's face was a mask of gradually fading terror and resentment; but it was perfectly plain that she could not be really hurt.

When he looked at Enid's face, as if to seek for reassurance, he was astonished at the vivid agony in it. She was as white as paper, and her eyes were large and anguished.

"She's not hurt, is she?" he asked as naturally as he could.

Enid made no answer; she was still staring at the girl, gripping her tightly.

" Come," said Nevill, almost sharply, " let's see the damage. Did it hit you, my dear? "

The child made no answer.

" Perambulator, Paul," said Nevill, jerking his head in its direction. " Wheel it behind the car. Come along, my dear, to the car; and let's see what's the matter."

It was becoming plainer every moment that no harm was done at all. The girl was standing quite at her ease, embarrassed far more by Enid's embrace than by anything else. Of course, it had been a shock to everybody, most of all, perhaps, to the child. However, there was no reason why there should be a scene. Besides, they were all in the narrow of the bridge.

" Enid," said Nevill, still a little abrupt of course, " just bring her along to the car."

He put his hand on the child's shoulder.

" Leave her! Leave her! " gasped Enid.

" Don't be upset," said Nevill. " There's no harm done at all. Don't give way, my darling."

Again he put his hand on the child's shoulder. She was still speechless.

" Leave her! " gasped Enid once more.

Nevill turned in despair; and, to his relief, saw a policeman advancing up the road.

" Thank God! " murmured Nevill.

He shortly explained the circumstances. That was his car; that was his chauffeur. His own name was Sir Nevill Fanning. There had very nearly been an accident; the child had fallen down. The policeman was quite sensible and civil. He nodded once or twice: then he turned to the child.

" Are you hurt, my dear? "

The child shook her head dolefully. The blue uniform seemed to have restored some degree of intelligence to her mind.

" Come along to the gentleman's car," he said.

" Let go, Enid," said Nevill.

Enid turned wild eyes upon him. Nevill went up to unloose her hands; it seemed to him that Enid was really not quite herself.

" Come! " he said. " We'll soon see what's the matter." Enid let go unwillingly; but her face was drawn and set. She said nothing.

There was nothing whatever the matter with the girl. She had just been touched by the wheel on the knees; but her stockings were not even torn. The policeman elicited from her where she lived — not a half-mile away.

" I'll take her along home," said Nevill. " Enid, my dear; you jump inside with her and the baby. Paul and I will sit in front."

The policeman said he would take the perambulator home. Nevill grinned secretly at the vision which his imagination presented of this.

" Very good," he said. " We'll wait till you come. You've got my number, no doubt."

" There'll be no difficulty, sir," said the policeman. " No harm done."

When Nevill turned again to see that all three were established inside, he saw that they had grouped themselves oddly. The child-nurse, rather pallid now, held the baby; and Enid, on her knees on the floor of the car, supported the girl's feet on her lap.

"My dear! What are you doing? There's no kind of necessity for that."

Enid shook her head fiercely. Nevill had a spasm of impatience.

" My darling; don't be ridiculous! She isn't hurt in the slightest."

So extraordinarily savage was the face turned on him that he recoiled; yet a strange feeling came upon him that Enid was not quite genuine. He felt very odd and confused. He made to close the door; then he hesitated; then he closed it, leaving them. He could talk out anything that needed it afterwards.

" My dear girl! Whatever's the matter? " said Nevill, a quarter of an hour later.

Everything had been perfectly satisfactory. They had found the girl's mother at home — a sensible woman who said that she had particularly told her daughter never to take the perambulator over the bridge; that no harm had been done at all; and that she hoped it would do the girl good. (So, for the third time that day Nevill had been a philanthropist.) He glanced at Enid to see if she was amused; but was met by a set face and unanswering eyes.

The policeman had followed a few minutes later, with the perambulator before, and a small procession of round-eyed boys behind; and there, too, everything had been satisfactory — even to the policeman; for Nevill gave him half a crown, privily. Yet all this while Enid had stood stony-faced, refusing to sit down; and speaking only when the woman spoke to her, in a very low voice.

Then Nevill had told Paul to drive; and himself got in after Enid into the closed car.

She said nothing in answer to his question.

He tried to take her hand; but she drew it away.

"Look here, my darling. Have I done anything?"

" Don't speak to me," she hissed.

He drew back.

" You aren't treating me fairly, my darling. I seem to have offended you. Remember our bargain. Tell me what I've done; and I'll beg your pardon."

She turned and eyed him; and if ever he saw hostility in any face, it was in hers. For a moment she did not speak. Then she suddenly began; and, as she talked, a kind of sickness grew on the other. It was as if the girl was possesed.

" Very well," she said. " I will tell you. It is the last straw. I have tried and tried: and it is useless. What have you done? Well, you have treated me brutally; but this is the last straw.... That you should tell me, publicly, not to be ridiculous; that you should try to tear me away by force when I was trying to help a poor child whom you had knocked down: that you should make me a laughing-stock — and before that woman too.... But that's only the last of the list.... You have treated me disgracefully.... Shall I go through it all?... Well; I will."

Then indeed she began.

She went right back to Hartley. It was there, it seemed, that he had begun to be careless and offensive. There was an occasion, it seemed, when he had made her stand while he sat. (Of this, he had neither then or at any other time the faintest recollection.) Then, it appeared, he had spoken to her rudely about Father Richardson; he had told her not to be so familiar; and then later, not to be so discourteous. Then he had allowed Masterson to be rude to her; and had laughed at her with Aunt Anna. Her whole stay at Hartley, it appeared, had been one series of insults received.

Then she passed on to London.

The insults, it seemed, had begun at the Academy. He had allowed her to go on alone, while he talked to her mother and her mother only; he had shown his dislike of

Lord Maresfield; oh! in little movements and glances: he had not said anything outright; but she was not a fool; she could understand him well enough. After dinner that same night, he had kept her and her mother waiting while he smoked with his friend....

Then the Selva affair came up. First he had been brutal in the way he had flatly contradicted her as to Selva's capabilities. He had told her she didn't understand what genius was. He had preferred to lean over the box and stare at that horrible painted woman, sooner than talk to her. Mr. Lennox, even, had had better manners. Then he had gone out after both acts in order to smoke again, instead of doing his duty — she thought he might at least have recognised his duty, if nothing else. Then he had gone and arranged behind her back that she too, and her mother, in spite of what he knew as to her feelings, should go and meet Selva — a woman who was unfit for decent society. He had dragged them there, against their will; he had stayed talking to Selva, leaving herself and her mother alone.

She had borne with these things; and had said nothing at the time, hoping that it was mere carelessness. That was why she had not protested then and there.

Then when she had tried, very gently, to show him what he was doing, he had had the grace to pretend to apologise; but had, really, repeated his offence.

" Didn't you apologise? Can you deny that? "

He bowed his head. He said nothing. (A horrible and grotesque memory came to his mind of how a certain cock at Frascati had once turned savagely on his hens when he himself was unhappy.)

" And now you won't even be civil enough to answer."

Then she swept on.

Tiny incidents he had forgotten — during the last three days which he had thought so happy — were dragged out and flung at him; but they all culminated in to-day. He had mocked at her friend Lord Maresfield; he had said London was dreary — " a desolate hole" — that to her, while he sat with her! He had stood, sulky, at the window and said nothing, even though she had laid down what she was reading, to talk to him. Then he had yawned in her face. (Nevill was too sick even to be tempted to smile.) Then, finally, had come the motor-drive. He had behaved like a road-hog. He had torn past the helpless old man in the Park; he had tried to get the better of a drayman; he had knocked down a child. And then — then once more came the crowning insult. She had tried to make up by sympathy for what he had done; and he had tried to tear her hands away from the child; he had told her not to make an exhibition of herself, publicly; he had laughed at her fears. He had tried to exchange glances with her in the very house of the poor woman whose child had been knocked down.

" It's the last straw. I can't bear it any more. I've borne enough. Be good enough not to speak to me."

He sat through it in silence. There was nothing to say. With three or four exceptions the substance of the tale was true enough for him to recognise it. There was scarcely more than a point or two in her torrent of charges that was objectively false.

He sat silent; because after her first three or four sentences he had seen the hopelessness. If she could say so much she could say anything; and no answer was possible.

But what held him, toward the end, in something very like horror, was the shocking change in her whole character from that which he had previously believed it to be: it was as if a mask had been torn suddenly away, and a frightful face disclosed. He had thought her very nearly sublime — unlike others, spiritual, aloof, unique. He had thought her markedly self-controlled, of an exquisiteness transcendent of that which breeding could give; tolerant, charitable, even great. He had loved this presentment that he had seen — loved it as he had never loved any living being before, to his knowledge: he had thought that she understood him perfectly; he had hoped humbly and simply that he was learning to understand her.

Yet now, in an instant, a terrifying kind of coarseness disclosed itself; she snarled at him; she framed, as well as she could, sentences and phrases with the object of giving as much pain as possible; she tortured things and words into sinister intentions that had never even crossed his mind. He was as one who goes to kiss his wife and is met by a devil's changeling. He had had no conception — not merely that one whom he loved could be so horribly transformed — but that human nature itself was capable of it.

Towards the end, some kind of coherence came back to his mind; and, as if without volition on his part, the thread of fiery beads, of which he had caught just a glimpse as he walked in the Park last Saturday — Good God! four days before, only — that thread began to run past again. He began to see that there had been that element in her all through — the fierce, rending, tearing tiger that loved to wound and mar, that rejoiced in pain. There was the other side of her still; he did not even now wholly forget that; the serene, tender, comprehending girl whose heart leapt so swiftly to meet his; but that disguise of hers — if it were no more than that — was a floating phantom that moved from him as he looked, leaving him with this fiend that seemed at present the unveiled reality.

He grew quieter yet, interiorly, as he saw these things; his whole physical self felt sick and exhausted; but yet the deadly peace increased, as she severed, with her two-edged tongue, fibre after fibre that bound him to herself; it was a deadly peace; he knew that well enough — the peace of a seared and white-ashed countryside over which a devouring flame has gone.

She did not end till they were sliding up past the Albert Memorial.

... *' Be good enough not to speak to me." Those were her last words.... " Be good enough not to speak to me."

They were in Cadogan Lane by now. It was up at that further end, visible beyond Paul's head, that they had passed out so happily a couple of hours ago. They had turned up through the square, he remembered, and so on, towards the Park.

These were the houses which he had seen when he had walked up in the rain before lunch; he remembered looking at them, and wondering vaguely who lived in them, as he had let down his umbrella.

Yes; and this was the door of the flat where Paul was drawing up so skilfully. Up those stairs was the door of the flat.... The car had stopped now. That was the porter he could see within the glass panels.

Oh! he must get out now; he was nearest that side;

and he must hold the door and help her out. The rain had stopped. There was no need to open an umbrella....

Yes; he would just push back the glass door on this side, while the porter held the other, that she might pass through....

She was gone through now. Yes: he had better go home....

..." Home, Paul."