The daughter of the Drummonds had found the courage of her race. She stared uncomprehendingly at the alarm in Mrs. Rooke's expression.
"Don't do anything rash," the little woman said, in a frightened voice. "Supposing Godfrey did not come back. Supposing——"
Again there sounded in the distance the voices of the vendors of evening papers. The voices came nearer, one, two, half a dozen of them. They were all shouting together.
"There must be some news," Mrs. Rooke said under her breath.
"I shall come and see you to-morrow," Nelly said. "To-morrow I shall be free to come and go where I like. Do you know that I was bidding this room and you and Bunny a long good-bye five minutes ago? And if he never comes back—well, he will know I waited for him."
So preoccupied was she with her intention that she never noticed the newspaper boys and men fluttering their Stop Press editions like the wings of some birds of evil omen. As she sat in the hansom she drew the engagement ring off her finger and dropped it into her purse. Then she sighed, as though an immense burden had fallen from her.
CHAPTER XXIII
THE NEWS IN THE WESTMINSTER
As Nelly's hansom drew up at her own door another hansom was just turning away from it. She wondered with an impatient wonder who could have come. At the moment she could not have endured any hindrance between her and her project of telling her father that the engagement with Robin was to come to an end. She was not in the least afraid of what she had to do. The spirit of the Drummonds was thoroughly awake now.