CHAPTER XXIII—ON THE SIDE OF THE ANGELS
THROUGHOUT the day following that of the expedition to Dartmoor, Nick seemed determined to keep out of Jean’s way. It was as though he feared she might force some confidence from him that he was loth to give, and, in consequence, deliberately avoided being alone with her.
On the second day, however, as luck would have it, she encountered him in the corridor just outside her own sitting-room. He was striding blindly along, obviously not heeding where he was going, and had almost collided with her before he realised that she was there.
He jerked himself backwards.
“I beg your pardon,” he muttered, still without looking at her, and made as though to pass on.
Jean checked him with a hand on his sleeve. She had not watched the dogged sullenness of his face throughout yesterday to no purpose, and now, as her swift gaze searched it anew, she felt convinced that something fresh had occurred to stir him. It was impossible for Jean to see a friend in trouble without wanting to “stand by.”
“Nick, old thing, what’s wrong?” she asked.
He stared at her unseeingly. “Wrong?” he muttered. “Wrong?”
“Yes. Come in here and let’s talk it out—whatever it is.” With gentle insistence she drew him into her sitting-room. “How,” she said, when she had established him in an easy-chair by the open window and herself in another, “what’s gone wrong? Are you still boiling over about that trick Sir Adrian played on Claire the day of the picnic?”
She spoke lightly—more lightly than the occasion warranted—of set purpose, hoping to reduce the tension under which Nick was obviously labouring. His face hurt her. The familiar lazy insouciance which was half its charm was blotted out of it by some heavy cloud of tragic significance. He looked as though he had not slept for days, and his eyes, the gaiety burnt out of them by pain, seemed sunken in his head.