She drew a long breath. "Oh, I was so afraid you wouldn't come!"
"I was here at twelve," he said.
"So you got the handkerchief. I put thirteen because I thought if I put one—it was so difficult to write—and, of course, I couldn't look at it to see if it was readable. I wrote it under the driving-rug. Oh, suppose you hadn't got it!"
"I can't suppose it. What should I have done if I hadn't?"
"Oh," she said, "don't! Please don't. I thought you'd understand it was serious. I shouldn't have asked you to come in the middle of the night to talk nonsense as if we were at a dance."
"What's serious?" he said.
She said, "Everything," and her voice trembled.
He took her arm, and felt that she herself was trembling.
"Come and sit down," he said, comfortably, as one might speak to a child in trouble. "Come and sit down and tell me all about it."
They sat down on the log, and he pulled the dark cloak she wore more closely round her.