"Colonel Trench," said she, "is a prisoner at Omdurman."
"Oh, yes," answered Durrance. "Feversham will not be quite alone. There is some comfort in that, and perhaps something may be done. When I hear from Calder I will tell you. Perhaps something may be done."
It was evident that Durrance had misconstrued her remark. He at all events was still in the dark as to the motive which had taken Feversham southward beyond the Egyptian patrols. And he must remain in the dark. For Ethne did not even now slacken in her determination still to pretend to have forgotten. She stood at the window with the letter clenched in her hand. She must utter no cry, she must not swoon; she must keep very still and quiet, and speak when needed with a quiet voice, even though she knew that Harry Feversham had gone southward to join Colonel Trench at Omdurman. But so much was beyond her strength. For as Colonel Durrance began to speak again, the desire to escape, to be alone with this terrible news, became irresistible. The cool quietude of the garden, the dark shadows of the trees, called to her.
"Perhaps you will wonder," said Durrance, "why I have told you to-night what I have up till now kept to myself. I did not dare to tell it you before. I want to explain why."
Ethne did not notice the exultation in his voice; she did not consider what his explanation might be; she only felt that she could not now endure to listen to it. The mere sound of a human voice had become an unendurable thing. She hardly knew indeed that Durrance was speaking, she was only aware that a voice spoke, and that the voice must stop. She was close by the window; a single silent step, and she was across the sill and free. Durrance continued to speak out of the darkness, engrossed in what he said, and Ethne did not listen to a word. She gathered her skirts carefully, so that they should not rustle, and stepped from the window. This was the third slip which she made upon that eventful night.
CHAPTER XIX
MRS. ADAIR INTERFERES
Ethne had thought to escape quite unobserved; but Mrs. Adair was sitting upon the terrace in the shadow of the house and not very far from the open window of the drawing-room. She saw Ethne lightly cross the terrace and run down the steps into the garden, and she wondered at the precipitancy of her movements. Ethne seemed to be taking flight, and in a sort of desperation. The incident was singular, and remarkably singular to Mrs. Adair, who from the angle in which she sat commanded a view of that open window through which the moonlight shone. She had seen Ethne turn out the lamp, and the swift change in the room from light to dark, with its suggestion of secrecy and the private talk of lovers, had been a torture to her. But she had not fled from the torture. She had sat listening, and the music as it floated out upon the garden with its thrill of happiness, its accent of yearning, and the low, hushed conversation which followed upon its cessation in that darkened room, had struck upon a chord of imagination in Mrs. Adair and had kindled her jealousy into a scorching flame. Then suddenly Ethne had taken flight. The possibility of a quarrel Mrs. Adair dismissed from her thoughts. She knew very well that Ethne was not of the kind which quarrels, nor would she escape by running away, should she be entangled in a quarrel. But something still more singular occurred. Durrance continued to speak in that room from which Ethne had escaped. The sound of his voice reached Mrs. Adair's ears, though she could not distinguish the words. It was clear to her that he believed Ethne to be still with him. Mrs. Adair rose from her seat and, walking silently upon the tips of her toes, came close to the open window. She heard Durrance laugh light-heartedly, and she listened to the words he spoke. She could hear them plainly now, though she could not see the man who spoke them. He sat in the shadows.
"I began to find out," he was saying, "even on that first afternoon at Hill Street two months ago, that there was only friendship on your side. My blindness helped me. With your face and your eyes in view I should have believed without question just what you wished me to believe. But you had no longer those defences. I on my side had grown quicker. I began in a word to see. For the first time in my life I began to see."