His mouth relaxed into a grim smile.
“This isn’t Clapham Junction,” he answered tersely. “There won’t be a train till ten o’clock to-night.”
A glint of humour danced in Jean’s eyes.
“In that case,” she returned gravely, “what do you advise?”
“I don’t advise,” he replied promptly. “I apologise. Please forgive such an ungracious reception, Miss Peterson—but you must acknowledge it was something in the nature of a surprise to find that you were—you!”
Jean laughed.
“It’s given you an unfair advantage, too,” she replied. “I still haven’t penetrated your incognito—but I suppose you are Mr. Brennan?”
“No. Nick Brennan’s my half-brother. I’m Blaise Tormarin, and, as my mother was unable to meet you herself, I came instead. Shall we go? I’ll give the station-master instructions about your baggage.”
So the unknown Englishman of Montavan was the man of whom the two women at the neighbouring lunch table in the hotel had been gossiping—the central figure of that most tragic love-affair! Jean thought she could discern, now, the origin of some of those embittered comments he had let fall when they were together in the mountains.
In silence she followed him out of the little wayside station to where the big head-lamps of a stationary car shed a blaze of light on the roadway, and presently they were slipping smoothly along between the high hedges which flanked the road on either hand.