“Oh, they don’t expect us for a week,” Crespin edged in, “and surely it won’t take us more than that to get back to civilization.” He spoke with more confidence than he felt.
And Basil Traherne felt less. The more he studied the place they’d landed on and the people, the less he thought of the chances of cordial hospitality or of quick and easy departure. But there was no use in saying so to Crespin here and now, and there was every reason for not saying or hinting it to Mrs. Crespin at all, unless a positive necessity compelled. But the next few days or hours might show brighter than his fears. God grant it! So he merely said, not too sanguine at heart, cheerful of voice, “Or at all events to a telegraph line,” and he marshaled a cheerful smile with his words. A man has a right to be cheerful as long as he can. And men of Traherne’s breed hold it a duty—a duty not to be shirked. If to borrow trouble is folly, to lend or impose it is crime.
“I suppose there’s no chance of flying back?” Mrs. Crespin asked more anxiously than she knew.
“Not the slightest, I’m afraid,” Traherne admitted. “I fancy the old bus is done for.”
“Oh, Dr. Traherne, what a shame! And you’d only had it a few weeks!” Her concern for the wrecked aeroplane was entirely sincere, but something bigger than that throbbed at her side and shook her voice just a little. The men were thoroughly frightened, and she sensed it and shared it. But her fear was far less than theirs; she knew Asia less, and she had two men beside her, men of her own race, one whom she trusted in all things, the other her husband. And only very small women can feel as sick a fear when companioned by men, as men feel who know themselves but inadequate protection for a woman who shares grave peril with them.
“And you’d only had it a few weeks,” she repeated.
“What does it matter so long as you are safe?” Traherne exclaimed with an uncontrollable impulse that his voice betrayed far more than the words did. It was love-making, his tone, and the woman is greatly loved to whom a strong man speaks with passionate tenderness at a time of desperate peril.
Lucilla threw up an instant barrier—for his protection, not for her own. And though she had no fear of Antony—such women do not fear the men they despise—she had intense fear of the shame of what he might say might cause her—and cause Traherne.
“What does it matter so long as we’re all safe?” she said quite lightly, almost gayly.
But Antony Crespin had caught the full significance of Traherne’s impulsive words. And, “That’s not what Traherne said,” he jibed bitterly. “Why pretend to be blind to his chivalry?”