Clara directed him to the seat fronting her; he protested indifference to the wet; she kept the door unshut. His temper would have preferred to buffet the angry weather. The invitation was too sweet.
She heard now the bell of her own train. Driving beside the railway embankment she met the train: it was eighteen minutes late, by her watch. And why, when it flung up its whale-spouts of steam, she was not journeying in it, she could not tell. She had acted of her free will: that she could say. Vernon had not induced her to remain; assuredly her present companion had not; and her whole heart was for flight: yet she was driving back to the Hall, not devoid of calmness. She speculated on the circumstance enough to think herself incomprehensible, and there left it, intent on the scene to come with Willoughby.
"I must choose a better day for London," she remarked.
De Craye bowed, but did not remove his eyes from her.
"Miss Middleton, you do not trust me."
She answered: "Say in what way. It seems to me that I do."
"I may speak?"
"If it depends on my authority."
"Fully?"
"Whatever you have to say. Let me stipulate, be not very grave. I want cheering in wet weather."