She drew on her fur coat, preparatory to walking with Julian the few hundred yards to their own gates.
As they turned away, Mark Easter handed Miss Marchrose into her cab, and they heard him say, "Good night, Annie Laurie."
VII
After that evening, Mark often called Miss Marchrose "Annie Laurie."
Julian frequently wondered what the result might be if he ever did so in the presence of Lady Rossiter.
Lady Rossiter, however, was much engaged with the valedictory meetings at which the members of the nature-class bade nature farewell until the return of warmer weather, and had no immediate leisure to bestow upon the growing friendship between Mark and Miss Marchrose.
Julian made his own observations, and was more than ever convinced that Mark Easter was in no danger from a repetition of the fate which had overtaken Captain Clarence Isbister. That episode, moreover, remained to him utterly incomprehensible. He surmised that the clue to it might be found in that contradiction between the half-mocking, half-defiant directness of Miss Marchrose's eyes and the curiously unconscious pathos of her mouth.
At the villa, Iris Easter for the time being remained installed, reaping an astonishing harvest of press-cuttings, variously indicating surprise, disgust, and admiration at the startling character of "Why, Ben!"
Mr. Douglas Garrett remained in Culmouth and interpreted the press-cuttings to her in his character of "one of we poor literary hacks."
In the first week of December there took place at the College one of the General Committee meetings so abhorred of Sir Julian.