"Jacinta has her moods," Olivia agreed. "However, if she wasn't very nice to you, she wasn't nice at all to me. Besides, you really ought not to have stopped when she was not at home. Jacinta is conventional, although she pretends she is not. We all are conventional, you know."
Kit looked hard at her and was hurt. Olivia, herself, had fixed the time for him to come, and had kept him when he would have gone. For all that he said nothing and she resumed in a gentle voice: "Well, you are going back with the steamer and I will not see you before you sail. You'll use caution, Kit?"
He thrilled, but said quietly: "I don't think much caution's indicated. We have gone twice and nothing has bothered us."
"Oh well," said Olivia: "you are obstinate and I suppose you must go. Perhaps I'm superstitious, but sometimes the third venture is unlucky." She touched his arm. "I don't want you to run a risk!"
Kit tried to seize her hand but she was gone. He saw her figure melt into the gloom among the tamarisk, and then, looking round, noted Wolf coming up the path.
"Hallo, Musgrave!" said Wolf. "Have you gone to the Commandancia for your papers?"
"I went in the afternoon and got the documents," Kit replied, and started for the road.
Wolf went to the veranda and talked to Mrs. Austin until some others arrived; then he crossed the floor. A chair by Olivia was unoccupied, and noting Wolf's advance, she gave a young man an inviting smile. The young man did not remark this and Wolf got the chair.
"Malin deserves to pay for his dullness," he said.
"Then you saw me signal?" Olivia rejoined. "All the same, you came!"