"We must hasten home now," said Paul, with a rapid transition to another tone. "The short cut from Claymount is somewhere hereabouts," looking round—"and we shall get back," he took out his watch, "before the house is shut up, if we walk briskly. You can walk, can't you? I mean, of course you will have to walk, but can you step out? If you would care to have an arm——"
"I can walk quite well, thank you—but, oh, Paul, just this—mayn't I say it——?"
"Better not, dear." The word slipped out; he was unconscious of it, but she heard. They hurried home.
CHAPTER XVII.
A KNIGHT TO THE RESCUE.
"No, you don't—and don't you think it."
Somebody, and that a formidable personage, had been a witness of the scene just narrated.
We would not for a moment call poor Val Purcell an eavesdropper au naturel, but he certainly had a talent for picking up by the wayside things which did not exactly belong to him.
Val, as we know, was not quite like other people.