“Tell me!” she pleaded.
“I’m not hurt,” he said gently. “Nothing for you to cry about, little sweetheart; only, don’t you see, you’ve got to get home quick, before he does? If you’ll go quietly to your room, and say nothing, there’ll be no harm done. Come, now!”
He took his arm from her shoulder, and started the engine. He went still faster now. She spoke, but he did not answer. His eyes were intent upon the road before him. He stopped at the foot of Serena’s garden.
“Now stroll up to the house as if you’d been taking a walk,” he said.
“No, I won’t! I can’t! I’m afraid you’re hurt!”
“Look here!” he said. “There’s just one thing on earth you can do for me, and that is to clear out. There’s nothing that could be so bad as your getting mixed up in this. I mean it! Don’t—don’t make it hard. Just go!”
She could not withstand his broken and anxious voice. She obeyed as a child obeys, leaden-hearted, in tears, only half comprehending, going simply because he entreated her to go. She opened the door of the car and got down into the road; but her scarf had caught in something. She pulled at it, jerked it upward, and still it held fast.
“Oh, go on!” he cried, as if in anger.
“It’s my scarf!” she explained, with a sob.
He turned to help her, tore the scarf loose, and then, with a strange little whistling sigh, doubled over, with his head lying against the side of the car.