“My darling!—my poor darling!—of course they only want your evidence.”
But his own voice shook and his eyes were dim. He tried to cheer her, to encourage her, to say words which he could hardly feel, but the girl scarcely seemed to hear him. Suddenly, in the midst of his vain efforts at consolation, she stood up.
“They are come,” said she.
Clifford started up. He had heard nothing. But Nell’s patient ears were keener than his. In another moment there was a knock at the outer door. And then a knock at the door of the room. He looked round wildly, and, seizing her arm, would have had her hide herself behind the little sofa, but she smiled sadly and shook her head.
“Come in!” she said.
And as the girl had foretold with uncannily correct prophecy, a sergeant of police from Stroan, very civil, very apologetic and humane, presented himself.
“Very sorry, Miss, to have to intrude,” said he. “But I must ask you to come along with me as far as Stroan, just to tell the magistrate something that will help us on a bit.”
“This is not an arrest?” said Clifford, trying to hide his anxiety.
“No, sir.”
But Nell’s white face seemed to betray the belief that it was.