‘What the devil——!’ There she was, Marion herself, in his wicker-chair. ‘My darling, you!’ He was amazed to find her there, and amazed by the unearthly beauty of her. She rose to meet him, excited fear shining in her large eyes.
‘Hullo, Jimmy! You won’t be glad to see me.’ How the deuce did she know that? ‘John has found out about us. He made a scene. He’s dangerous. I’ve fled the house.’
‘Marion, what a wonderful girl you are! What a study in contrast—your fragrant English girlhood, and your exotic chintz dress!’ He enfolded her in arms of solicitude. ‘My dear, tell me it all.’
‘That’s all. People have been talking to him. He threatened me. So I came here.’
He could see her nostrils dilate and her breasts flutter in the intoxication of the danger. ‘Like netted fish they leap,’ he quoted to himself. Aloud he murmured: ‘Darling, you came here. Yes, of course. But how....’
‘Oh, I found out where it was and just came. There was a woman here——’
He was startled. ‘A woman?... Oh, Mrs. Phillips, perhaps, the woman who cleans up.’
‘Yes. I told her I was a friend of your wife’s, and she let me stay. Cheek, wasn’t it! Invented a wife for you. Just bluff, but it came off.... Do give me a cigarette.’
But this would never do. Here they were alone together, in a most compromising situation, while her husband—positively a dangerous fellow—raged round the countryside looking for her, perhaps with a pistol. At any moment——‘But, my darling girl, is it wise?’
With no sign of having heard the question, she rested her head on his shoulder. ‘Darling Jimmy, what shall I do?’