In desperation he wired back, “Name terms, Kennedy,” and paid reply. There were a few patients he was bound to see. The time had to be got through somehow. But at twelve o’clock he started for Carbies. Margaret had not expected to see him again. She had said good-bye to him, to the whole incident. Her “consciousness of rectitude,” as far as Peter Kennedy was concerned, was as complete as Mrs. Roope’s. She had found him little better than a country yokel, and now saw him with a future before him, a future she still vaguely meant to forward—only vaguely. Definitely all her thoughts were with Gabriel and the hours they would pass together. She was meeting him at the station at three o’clock. She remembered the first time she had met him at Pineland station, and smiled at the remembrance. He might cut himself shaving with impunity now, and the shape of his hat or his coat mattered not one jot.
Not expecting Peter Kennedy, but Gabriel Stanton, she was already arrayed in one of her trousseau dresses, a simple walking-costume of blue serge, a shirt of fine cambric, and was spending a happy hour trying on hat after hat to decide not only which was most suitable but which was the most becoming. Hearing wheels on the gravel she looked out of the window. Seeing Peter she almost made up her mind not to go down. She had just decided on a toque of pansies ... she might try the effect on Peter. She was a little disingenuous with herself, vanity was the real motive, although she sought for another as she went downstairs.
Peter was in the drawing-room, staring vacantly out of the window. He never noticed her new clothes. She saw that in his eyes, and it quenched any welcome there might have been in hers. It was her expression he answered with his impulsive:
“I had to come!”
“Had you?”
“You mustn’t be satirical,” he said desperately. “Or be what you like, what does it matter? I’d rather have shot myself than come to you with such news....” Her sudden pallor shook him. “You can guess of course.”
“No, I can’t.”
“That blasted woman!”
“Go on.”
“She has written again. Sit down.” She sank into the easy-chair. All her radiance was quenched, she looked piteous, pitiable. He could not look at her.