Shima would tell her—but Mrs. Britton had been out all day. He did not know when she would be back.
The words sounded ominous in Flora's ears. She turned away. Was everything to be finished just as she had light enough to move, but before she had a chance?
The sound of spinning wheels on the drive startled her to fresh hope, and sent her hurrying down the stair. It was the phaëton returning from the last train. Through the open door she saw the figure of Mrs. Herrick expectant on the veranda. Then the carriage came into the porte-cochère and passed. With a rush she reached the veranda, and stood there looking after it. She wouldn't believe her eyes—she couldn't—that it had returned again empty.
Mrs. Herrick's voice was asking her, "What shall we do? Shall we serve dinner now, or wait a little longer?"
"Oh, it's no use," Flora murmured, "he won't come to-night. He'll never come." She drooped against the tall porch pillar.
"My poor child!" Mrs. Herrick took her passive hand. If she read in the profound discouragement of Flora's face that something more had transpired than a mere non-appearance, she did not show it, but waited, alert and quiet, while they gazed together out over the darkening garden.
It was the time of twilight when the sky is so much brighter than the earth. Across the lawns between the bushes from hedge to hedge the veil of the obscuring light was coming in; and through it the avenue of willows marched darkly. Their leaves moved a little. Flora watched the ripple of their tops, clear on the bright sky, and deeper down among mysterious branches there was a sense of movement where the eyes could not see. There was a curious flick, flick, flicker—a progression, a passing from the far dark end of the willow avenue toward where it met the vista of the drive. Flora's eyes, absently, involuntarily, followed the movement. She felt Mrs. Herrick's hand suddenly close on hers.
"Is some one coming?"
They clung to each other, peering timorously down the drive. A little gust of wind took the garden, and before the trees had ceased to tremble and whiten a man had emerged from their shadow and was advancing upon them up the middle of the drive.
Flora's heart leaped at sight of him. All her impulse was to fly to meet him, but she felt Mrs. Herrick's hand tighten upon her wrist as if it divined her madness.