"Cross my heart and hope to die—"
"But ... how will you get here? Not alone, through the woods! I can't permit that."
"Elise shall row me down the shore and then go back to keep cook company. Sum Fat can see me home—if you find it still necessary to keep up the invalid pose."
"I'm afraid," he laughed, "I shall call my own bluff.... Must you really go so soon?"
"Good afternoon," she returned demurely; and ran down the steps and off to her boat.
Smiling quietly to himself, Whitaker watched her cast the boat off, get under way, and swing it out of sight behind the trees. Then his smile wavered and faded and gave place to a look of acute discontent.
He rose and limped indoors to ransack Ember's wardrobe for evening clothes—which he failed, perhaps fortunately, to find.
He regarded with an overwhelming sense of desolation the tremendous arid waste of time which must intervene before he dared expect her: a good four hours—no, four and a half, since she would in all likelihood dine at a sensible hour, say about eight o'clock. By half-past eight, then, he might begin to look for her; but, since she was indisputably no woman to cheapen herself, she would probably keep him waiting till nearly nine.
Colossal waste of time, impossible to contemplate without exacerbation...!
To make matters worse, Sum Fat innocently enough served Whitaker's dinner promptly at six, under the misapprehension that a decent consideration for his foot would induce the young man to seek his bed something earlier than usual.