I returned then to the girl, who was sitting on the ground with her hands clasped over her face. I guessed she was as desperately puzzled as I was what to do next.
She sprang up quickly as I approached, and again stared at me with much the same expression of anxiety and doubt.
“You seem very clever and resourceful,” she said. “Can yet get me a horse?”
“What for? To lose yourself in the darkness among the hills?”
“I can pay you—later, I mean. I have no money on me. Tell me how to send it to you, and I will give you any price you name. And I will add to it a generous reward for what you have done already.”
“Do you think you are strong enough to travel yet? You are still very white, and trembling like a leaf. You are scarcely used to this sort of thing, you see.”
“I can judge that for myself,” she answered, almost haughtily, making a great effort to rally her shaken nerves.
“I don’t think you are. You don’t realise yet how much this thing has shaken you.”
“I am not accustomed to be contradicted in this way.”
“You are very near contradicting yourself by fainting,” I answered. I could see it plainly. “How long have you been without food?”