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He was the last passenger to squeeze through the barrier. As he scrambled into his carriage, the train was on the point of moving. Spreading one of his many papers on his knees, he lit a cigarette. He believed he was behaving as though nothing had happened. “That I can take it like this proves that she was nothing to me,” he assured himself.
Ten minutes later he discovered that he had not read a line and that the cigarette had gone out.
“I suppose I'm a bit upset,” he admitted, “though goodness knows why I should be. The matter's ended exactly as I wanted.”
But had it? What had he wanted? Does a man ever know what he wants where a woman is concerned? He desires most the thing which he most dreads. During the voyage he had wanted to win her from Prince Rogovich. On the tug he had wanted to forget her. In the cab he had wanted to go on kissing her forever. That morning he had wanted to save his freedom. On the station, like a maddened schoolboy, his terror had been lest he might lose her.
As a result he had lost her. Somewhere through the sunny lanes of Devon she was speeding with the gentleman who “couldn't speak no English” and wore goggles. In which direction and for what purpose he could not guess.
He smiled bitterly. It was a situation which called for mirth. He had accused her of having trapped him at a time when she herself had been escaping from him. He had complained that her affection was too ardently obvious at a moment when she was proving herself most coldly elusive. While he had been resenting the way in which he was being hunted, she had already abandoned him to hunt to his heart's content.
His reflections were broken in upon by a weakeyed old clergyman seated opposite to him in the far corner.
“Excuse me, but I see by your labels that you've just landed. May I ask whether your vessel was the Ryndam?”
“It was.”