I knew he’d felt the flick of my last remark. I also knew how he would have liked to retaliate. Any time since that first evening in the den I have seen in his eye the yearning to take me by the shoulders and shake me.
But he said serenely: “It is a glorious morning, certainly. Too fine not to walk down to Sevenoaks, so I’m starting a little earlier.”
Good! I thought. I always welcomed the moment that saw the last, for the whole happy, idle day, of the only inhabitant of The Lawn with whom I’m not on excellent terms. Once he’s out of the house, I can enjoy myself and forget (almost) why I’m in it.
So it was an annoying shock to me when he stopped short on his way to the door and added:
“Nancy, do you care to come part of the way towards the station with me?”
He had me there. I saw there was no escape. For the first time this week he was able to check me in having things all my own way; and, mortified and irritated as I felt, I could only smile up at him in Manner A, and reply, all eager delight:
“Oh, I’d love it! Give me two minutes to put on my hat.”
In five minutes—for I knew he’d loads of time for his train, and it was still a further turning of the tables to keep the Governor waiting—I joined him outside the front door.
Presently we were walking briskly together down the drive between the green cliffs of laurel; the air was sweet with the scent of sun-warmed lilac, the sky was cloudless, the morning all sunshine—everything, in fact, was as unlike my own mood as might be.
For I’d guessed that I was “in for” something. And although I didn’t yet know what this might be—although it seemed a whole pre-existence since the day when the prospect of a few words from the Head of the firm made his trembling typist feel that the end of all things was at hand!—I still felt, amongst other emotions, a little frightened. Again I saw in my mind that odd, half-amused, half-threatening stare which the Governor had bent upon me that first evening when I said good-night at the door of his den. Supposing I wasn’t able to keep the reins in my own hands after all? A new nervousness mingled in me with an utterly new form of resentment.