Hal suppressed a smile. “I suppose you told him I was out.”
“Yes, miss. He wanted to know when you would be back, and I asked Mr. Watson, and he told me to say ‘Not before evening.’”
Hal climbed to the top of a bus, and journeyed homewards with a thoughtful air. Of course he would ring her up again the next day, and then what was she to say?
In the meantime, looming big in her immediate horizon was the visit to be paid to Holloway that evening. She was going up without Dudley, having expressed a wish to do so, with which he had willingly complied. She felt it would be easier not to appear forced without him, and would be fairer on Doris also. Yet she dreaded the visit very much, and longed that it was over.
Ethel opened the door to her, as she happened to be in the little kitchen close beside it, and Hal thought she looked very ill as she grasped her hand with warm friendliness, saying:
“How nice of you to come and see Doris so soon.”
“What are you doing in the kitchen?” said Hal. “I want to come and help.”
“I’m only making a salad, and shall not be long. You must go to the parlour”; and she laughed at the quaint, old-fashioned word.
“No, I’m coming to help,” and Hal walked past her, through the open door. “How’s Basil? Dudley spoke as if he was not quite so well just now.”
“I’m afraid he isn’t,” with sudden, hardly veiled anxiety; “but it may only be the foggy weather.”