So again they were in the street, and the door swung to behind them. Wyndham was carrying his package, unexpectedly heavy, all concentrated weight, like a dumb-bell. The point caught her attention, and in a flash she changed again, was once more the amused laughing comrade, even though the sky was clouded now and tiny specks of rain flew in their faces.
"A midnight expedition!" she cried. "Let it be a hansom this time."
At the corner of Knightsbridge they found one, and they were off again at a trot; a fact so astonishing that they could hardly grasp it. And then, instead of feeling broken with fatigue at the end of a long day, they found themselves fresh and spirited, as at the beginning of a new adventure.
Soon they were cutting down Sloane Street, and then Wyndham suggested they should go the more interesting way round, so as to take in the Embankment, and drive into the Tite Street at the river end. It would leave a pleasanter impression with her, he argued, and Lady Betty readily assented. He gave the man the word, but straightway again the pair were deep in conversation, and lost all sense of the outer world.
Some minutes passed. Suddenly their driver gave a shout, the hansom jerked violently, and Lady Betty, clutching at Wyndham's hand, saw a woman just step back in time from under the horse's head. The driver cracked his whip and shouted something angrily, and then the hansom moved on again. Wyndham stared out into the night. He saw the line of lights gleaming along the parapet of the river, and recognised they were within a short distance of Tite Street. But the woman was already lost in the gloom.
XXIV
At the table that evening, Alice Robinson announced that she was going to meet Wyndham immediately after dinner. Had her parents not been accustomed to her departure at such summary notice, they might have observed the touch of embarrassment that accompanied it. For, although the expedition had been planned and considered for twenty-four hours on end, Alice found the initial falsehood singularly agitating. Painfully conscious of this lack of sangfroid, and fearful of betraying herself, she felt she must escape from the house as soon as was plausible. So, a little later, she rose in feverish haste from the dinner-table, and went to her room to put on her wrappings. No one was to wait up for her, in case she might be late, she said; she was taking a latch-key as usual. Then she slipped out of the house, and went down the street rapidly.
Some little time had elapsed before she had control of her wits and began to reflect. She had been impelled to start far earlier than she had calculated, and thus she undoubtedly ran the danger of finding Wyndham there, if she went straight to the studio. It was half-past eight; by taking various omnibuses she could fill out the time and be there by half-past nine. But even that seemed too early—he might be only just on the point of going out to his club engagement. No, to be absolutely safe, she would not venture actually to intrude till ten o'clock.