CHAPTER XLIII.—ON THE SON OF APHRODITE.
WHAT can be the matter? How did you manage to come here? You must have travelled by the same train as we came by. Oh, Harold, my husband, I am so glad to see you. You have changed your mind—you are coming on with me? Oh, I see it all now. You meant all along to give me this delightful surprise.”
The words came from her in a torrent as she put her hand on his arm—he could feel the ring on her finger.
“No, no,” said he; “everything remains as it was this morning. I only wish that I were going on with you. Providentially something occurred to me when I was sitting alone after lunch. That is why I came. I managed to catch a train that brought me here just now—the train I was in ran past this platform and I saw your face.”
“What can have occurred to you that you could not tell me in a letter?” she asked, her face still bearing the look of glad surprise that had come to it when she had heard the sound of his voice.
“We shall have to go into a waiting-room, or—better still—an empty carriage,” said he. “I see several men whom I know, and—worse luck! women—they are on their way to Abbeylands, and if they saw us together in this confidential way, they would never cease chattering when they arrived. We shall get into a compartment—there is one that still remains unlighted, it will be the best for our purpose; there will be no chance of a prying face appearing at the window.”
“Shall we have time?” she asked.
“Plenty of time. By getting into the carriage you will run no chance of being left behind—the worst that can happen is that I may be carried on with you.”
“The worst? Oh, that is the best—the best.” They had strolled to the end of the platform where it was dimly lighted, and in an instant, apparently unobserved by anyone, they had got into an unlighted compartment at the rear of the train, and Harold shut the door quietly, so as not to attract the attention of the three or four men in knickerbockers who were stretching their legs on the platform until the train was ready to start.
“We are fortunate,” said he. “Those men outside will be your fellow-guests for the week. None of them will think of glancing into a dark carriage; but if one of them does so, he will be nothing the wiser.”