“I have another plan. Suppose we get tea at Hadriansford? I reckon we could get there in forty minutes. The road’s pretty good.”
Evelyn hesitated. Hadriansford was twenty miles off, and Mrs. Haigh was not at home. All the same, she wanted to go. To steal off to the little town would banish her moodiness.
“If we could be back in two hours——”
“I’ll promise to do so,” Ledward replied, and Evelyn went for a thick coat.
The car climbed a long hill, and at the top Evelyn looked about. Although the moon was shining, the sunset was not gone, and far off across the misty plain the sky was red. In front, the moor, broken by dark gullies and dotted by sparkling pools, rolled back in the moonlight, and the wet road was like a silver riband. A curfew called, and the high, trembling note gave the wilds a touch of mystery.
Evelyn admitted that all was beautiful, and she pictured Kit’s enthusiasm for the moors when they picnicked at the tarn. The open spaces called Kit; he was romantic and followed his bent. He stood for something fine and elusive, and she had tried to play up, but her pluck was not like Kit’s. Where she hesitated he went joyously forward.
Ledward was rather her sort; he stood for prudence, comfort and conventional rules. Although he had tempted her to adventures, she knew she risked nothing. Harry, so to speak, was safe and solid. Now he wore his thick driving coat his figure was bulky, but its bulkiness was somehow reassuring. He kept the crown of the road, and when they plunged into a ghyll his foot was on the brake. Evelyn approved his caution, but Kit would have let the car go.
“You are Jasper Carson’s secretary, are you not?” she said.
“I rather think I’m his factotum,” Ledward replied with a laugh. “I help where he reckons my help is useful, and undertake odd jobs.”
“Kit was really the man for Jasper.”