Upon the stairs she met Henry.
“Hullo!” he cried, “going out? There’s a lot of rain coming.”
“I know,” she answered quietly. “I have to see Penhaligan. It’s important.”
He looked at her little black hat; her black coat. These were not the things that one put on for a hurried excursion into the village.
“You’ll be late for dinner,” he said.
“No, I shan’t,” she answered, “I must hurry.” She brushed past him; she had an impulse to put her arms round his neck and kiss him, but she did not look back.
She went through the hall; he turned on the stairs and watched her, then went slowly to his room.
When she came out on to the high road the wind had fallen and the rain was coming in slow heavy drops. The sky was all black, except that at its very heart there burnt a brilliant star; just above the horizon there was a bar of sharp-edged gold. When she came to the ‘Three Pilchards’ the world was lit with a strange half-light so that, although one could see all things distinctly, there was yet the suggestion that nothing was what it seemed. The ‘jingle’ was there, and Philip standing in conversation with Dick Penhaligan.
“Nasty night ’twill be, Miss Katherine. Whisht sort o’ weather. Shouldn’t like for ’ee to get properly wet. Open jingle tu.”
“That’s all right, Dick,” she answered. “We’ve got to meet the train. I’ve been wet before now, you know.”