“I am afraid,” he said kindly, “that you are not well to-day. Has that fellow been frightening or ill-using you?”
Her face was very close to his, and he fancied that he could hear her teeth chattering. She was obviously terrified.
“We must not be talking too seriously,” she murmured. “He may be here at any moment. I want you to remember that there is a price set upon you and he means to earn it. He would have killed you before, but he wants to avoid detection. You had better tell the captain everything. Remember, you must be on the watch always.”
“I can protect myself now that I am warned,” he said, reassuringly. “I have carried my life in my hands many a time before. But you?”
She shivered.
“They tell me,” she whispered, “that from Boston you can take a train right across the Continent, thousands of miles. I am going to take the very first one that starts when I land, and I am going to hide somewhere in the furthest corner of the world I can get to. To live in such fear would drive me mad, and I am not a coward. Let us walk; he will not think so much of our being together then.”
“I am going to send for a wrap,” he said, looking down at her thin dinner dress; “it is much too cold for you here bare-headed. We will send the steward for something.”
They turned round to find a tall form at their elbows. Mr. Watson’s voice, thin and satirical, broke the momentary silence.
“You are in a great hurry for fresh air, Violet. I have brought your cape; allow me to put it on.”
He stooped down and threw the wrap over her shoulders. Then he drew her reluctant fingers through his arm.