He sighed. He could not arrange that for her but he told the man to drive more slowly. Against the dark upholstery of the car, her face was like a young moon, wan and too weary for its work. He slipped his arm under her back and drew her to him. Pulling off her hat, she found a place for her head against his shoulder and he shut his eyes. She breathed regularly and lightly, as though she were asleep, but presently she said, “Charles, I don’t mean anything by this, but you are the only friend I have. You won’t think I mean anything, will you?”
He shook his head and it came to rest on hers. He, too, wished they might go on like this for ever, to the world’s edge.
The car was stopped at a little distance from the house and Henrietta had to rouse herself from the state between waking and sleeping, thought and imagery, in which she had passed the journey. The jarring of the brake shocked her into a recognition of facts and the gentle humming of the engine reminded her that life had to go on as before. The persistent sound, regular, not loud, controlled, was like existence in Nelson Lodge; one wearied of it, yet one would weary more of accidents breaking the healthy beating of the engine: to-night had been one of the accidents and she was terribly tired. No wonder! She had been trying to run away with a man who did not want her, a man who had a lonely, miserable invalid for a wife, the old lover of Aunt Rose. A little blaze of anger flared up at the thought of Rose; nevertheless, she continued her self-accusations. She had been willing to leave her aunts without a word and they had been good to her and one of them was ill, and the very money in her pocket was not her own. She was shocked by her behaviour. She was like her father, who took what belonged to other people and used it badly.
She sat, flaccid, her hands loose on her lap. She felt incapable of movement, but Charles was speaking to her, telling her to get out and run home quickly. She looked at him. She was holding his friendly hand. What would she have done without him? She saw herself in the train, speeding through the lonely darkness; she saw herself knocking at Mrs. Banks’s door, felt herself clasped to the doubtful blackness of that bosom, and she shuddered.
“You must go,” Charles said, but he still held her hand.
He had brought her back to cleanliness and comfort, he had saved her from behaviour of gross ingratitude, he had been marvellously kind and wise.
“Charles,” she said, “it’s awful.”
“No, it’s all right. We’ve been to a concert.”
“Yes”—her voice sank—“I’ve kept that promise. But the whole thing— and Aunt Caroline so ill. She may have died.”