It happened as Olwen brought to him, with a little air of triumph, the typed copy and the duplicate of the last section of the last chapter of his book on "Agarics."
"So that's finished," she said.
"That's finished," agreed the Professor, his brown gaze running over the sheets. "Olwen, I've done well here. This has been an excellent place for work; excellent." He laid the copy down on that chaotic work-table of his, and added, with cheerfulness, "Well! There's nothing to keep us here any longer, now."
This Olwen did not take in at once. "Nothing to keep us, Uncle?"
"Only the passports to be visé'd and made out for Paris," returned the old man. "I want to stay a night or so in Paris before I go on to London."
A great blankness fell upon Olwen's small face. "The passports," she repeated. "Paris!!! You mean you want us to leave quite soon?"
The Professor's head was bent over his work-table. "A couple of days, my dear, I suppose. You can be packed up and all that by then. You are broken in by now, aren't you, to your packing up and getting on without much warning?"
But this had taken Olwen without any warning, it appeared.
She stood there as if frozen, and said, "Away from here!" and in her heart exclaimed, "Away from him!" She stood aghast, an image of all the maids in love who have ever been sentenced to banishment from the presence of the beloved. She had put away from her up to now all thought of such a dreadful thing happening. Simply, she could not have imagined it. Going away from the hotel in the pine forest, while he still was left in it! Going away, before he had ever said to her a word that counted? Going away—with that Charm unproved?