“Now that’s delightful! I really did not feel quite equal to the drive, but I was anxious for you to see poor William.”
It was owing to this conversation that, two hours later, Andy encountered the couple in the wood, or rather followed them for a brief distance down one of the cross-roads; and he could not help being struck—no one could—by the efforts Elizabeth was making to please her companion. He had still hoped in the very depths of his mind that she might be pining for him, as he was for her; but now he saw that she could be engrossed in another fellow without even feeling that he was only fifty yards away from her. He decided that if she had ever loved him she must have felt that he was near.
So he turned dejectedly down the next opening without making his presence known, and could not know that Elizabeth was fascinating against time, which is, really, no such pleasing occupation, though an engrossing one.
At last, however, the habits of a lifetime asserted themselves and the ornithologist looked at his watch.
“My dear Miss Elizabeth”—that shows how far he had got—“do you know it is nearly one?”
“Never!” said the deceitful Elizabeth.
“I fear,” said the gentleman, very much worried, “that I shall now not have time to see the parrot. My train leaves at two-fifteen.”
“Does it really?” said Elizabeth.
“I would have stayed on, but I have an important meeting to-night,” he continued, pushing his hat up from his forehead. “But”—he relaxed into an affectionate smile—“I shall hope to come again soon—very soon. I shall explain that to Mrs. Atterton.”
“We shall have to hurry frightfully if we are to be back in time,” said Elizabeth, suiting the action to the word.