"Don't touch me!" she said, wrenching herself free. "Don't touch me, you cruel and wicked and heartless--! Go to Magsie! Tell her that I sent you to her! Take your hands off me, Warren--"
Standing back, discomfited, he attempted reason.
"Rachael! Don't talk so! I don't know what to make of you! Why, I never saw you like this. I never heard you--"
The door of her room closed behind her. She was gone. A long silence fell in the troubled room where their voices had warred so lately.
Warren looked at his watch, looked at her door. Then he went out the other door, and downstairs, and out of the house. Rachael heard him go. She was still breathing fast, still blind to everything but her own fury. She would punish him, she would punish him. He should have his verdict from the world he trusted so serenely; he should have his Magsie.
The clocks struck eleven: first the slow clock in her sitting-room, then the quick silvery echo from downstairs. Rachael glanced about nervously. The Bank--the boys' lunches--the trunks--
She went downstairs. In the little breakfast-room off the big dining-room the array of Warren's breakfast waited. Old Mary, with the boys, had just come in the side door.
"Mary," Rachael said quickly, "I want you to help me. Pack some clothes for the boys and me, and give them some luncheon. We are going down to Clark's Hills on the two o'clock train--"
"My God! Mrs. Gregory, you look very bad, my dear!" said Mary.
The unconscious endearment, the shock and concern visible on Mary's homely, honest face were too much for Rachael. Her face changed to ivory, she put one hand to her throat, and her lips quivered.