"What did Mrs. Oxenham tell you?" But he divined what it was. "That there was a lady on board whom I was specially interested in?"
"She thought you were engaged to her."
"Oh, did she? People have no business to think about those matters; they ought to know, before they talk. That lady was just about the last woman in the world to suit me. And they bored me to death—the whole lot of them."
Jenny's heart leaped in her breast, but still she did not dare to ask herself what his words and his visit portended. They had begun to climb the mountain pathway, a devious and stony track through wattle bushes and gum saplings, and it had grown almost too dark to see his face.
"Have we not gone far enough?" she asked him, pausing.
"It is the scrub that shuts the light out," he said quickly. "And there will be a moon directly. Just a little further, and we shall get the breeze from the top. Does it tire you? Let me help you up."
He offered his arm, but she declined it. She was not tired, but nervous about being out so late and so far from home.
"Not with me," he said; and added, "There's nothing clandestine about it. Mrs. Rogerson knows—at any rate, she will when I take you home—and so does Mary."
"Does Mrs. Oxenham know that I am walking here with you?" she was impelled to inquire, breathlessly.
"Most certainly she does."