Jeff turned slightly and saw the figure by the truck.
"She's going to take this train," said Lydia. "She's going to Reardon. O Jeff, it's wicked."
Lydia had never thought much about things that were wicked. Either they were brave things to do and you did them if you wanted to, or they were underhand, hideous things and then you didn't want to do them. But suddenly Esther seemed to her something floating, tossed and driven to be caught up and saved from being swamped by what seas she knew not. Jeff walked over to the dark figure by the truck. Whether he had expected it to be Esther he could not have said, but even as it shrank from him he knew.
"Come," said he. "Come home with me."
Esther stood perfectly silent like a shrinking wild thing endowed with a protective catalepsy.
"Esther," said he, "I know where you're going. You mustn't go. You sha'n't. Come home with me."
And as she did not move or answer he put his arm through hers and guided her away. Just beyond the corner of the station in a back eddy of solitude, she flung him off and darted three or four steps obliquely before he caught her up and held her. Lydia, standing in the shadow, her heart beating hard, heard his unmoved voice.
"Esther, you're not afraid of me? Come home with me. I won't touch you if you'll promise to come. I can't let you go. I can't. It would be the worst thing that ever happened to you."
"How do you know," she called, in a high hysterical voice, "where I'm going?"
"You were going with somebody you mustn't go with," said Jeff. "We won't talk about him. If he were here I shouldn't touch him. He's only a fool. And it's your fault if you're going. But you mustn't go."