He waited some moments, then his voice sounded gently,
half mocking, half reproachful.
He laughed, but did not reply.
She sat perfectly still for some time. She had
ceased to cry. In the darkness her face was
set and sullen. Sometimes a spray of rain blew
across it. She drew her hand from his, and rose
to her feet.
“Ill go in now,” she said.
“You’re not offended, are you?”
he asked.
They stepped down in the darkness from their perch.
She strode off for some little way. Then she
turned and said:
“Yes, I think it is rather insulting.”
“Nay,” he said. “Not it!
Not it!”
And he followed her to the gate.
She opened with her key, and they crossed the road
to her door.
“Good-night,” she said, turning and giving
him her hand.
“You’ll come and have dinner with me—or
lunch—will you? When shall we make
it?” he asked.
“Well, I can’t say for certain—I’m
very busy just now. I’ll let you know.”
A policeman shed his light on the pair of them as
they stood on the step.
“All right,” said Aaron, dropping back,
and she hastily opened the big door, and entered.
The Lillys had a labourer’s cottage in Hampshire—pleasant
enough. They were poor. Lilly was a little,
dark, thin, quick fellow, his wife was strong and
fair. They had known Robert and Julia for some
years, but Josephine and Jim were new acquaintances,—fairly
new.
One day in early spring Lilly had a telegram, “Coming
to see you arrive 4:30—Bricknell.”
He was surprised, but he and his wife got the spare
room ready. And at four o’clock Lilly went
off to the station. He was a few minutes late,
and saw Jim’s tall, rather elegant figure stalking
down the station path. Jim had been an officer
in the regular army, and still spent hours with his
tailor. But instead of being a soldier he was
a sort of socialist, and a red-hot revolutionary
of a very ineffectual sort.
“Good lad!” he exclaimed, as Lilly came
up. “Thought you wouldn’t mind.”
“Not at all. Let me carry your bag.”
Jim had a bag and a knapsack.
“I had an inspiration this morning,” said
Jim. “I suddenly saw that if there was
a man in England who could save me, it was you.”
“Save you from what?” asked Lilly, rather
abashed.
“Eh—?” and Jim stooped, grinning
at the smaller man.
Lilly was somewhat puzzled, but he had a certain belief
in himself as a saviour. The two men tramped
rather incongruously through the lanes to the cottage.
Tanny was in the doorway as they came up the garden
path.
