But the suspense and the uncertainty had got on her nerves, and she had made up her mind to leave Rosedean perhaps for as long as a fortnight. Two days ago she had written to various friends who were always glad to see her. That was why, as she stood at the gate, she was able to tell herself that she was waiting for the postman.
She thought it very probable that Godfrey Pavely would be walking past her house about this time. A couple of days ago he had come in for about half an hour, but he had been dull and ill at ease, his mind evidently full of something he was unwilling or ashamed to tell. And she had watched him with an amused, sympathetic curiosity, wondering how long his cautious reticence would endure. If she had put her mind to it, perhaps Katty could have made him speak of that which filled his sore heart, but she felt that the time was not yet ripe for words between herself and Godfrey. She was afraid of jarring him, of making him say something to her which both of them afterwards might regret. No, not any words of love to herself—of that she was not afraid—but some dogmatic pronouncement on divorce, and perchance on re-marriage.
And then, as she stood there, glancing up and down the lonely country road, she suddenly saw a man walking quickly towards her—not from Pewsbury, but from the opposite direction, which led only from The Chase.
Katty's bright brown eyes were very good eyes, and long before the stranger could see her she had, as it were, taken stock of him. Somehow his clothes were not English-looking, and he wore a kind of grey Homburg hat.
He was walking at a great pace, and as he came nearer, some vague feeling of curiosity made Katty step out of the gate, and look straight up the road towards him. All at once she made up her mind that he was American—a well-to-do and, according to his lights, a well-dressed American.
Now Katty Winslow looked very charming, as she stood out there, in her heather-mixture tweed skirt, and pale blue flannel blouse—charming, and also young. And the stranger—to her he seemed entirely a stranger—when he was quite close up to her, suddenly took off his hat and exclaimed, "Why, Miss Fenton! It is Miss Fenton, isn't it?"
He was now smiling broadly into her face, his bold, rather challenging eyes—the blue eyes which were the best feature of his face, and the only feature which recalled his beautiful sister—full of cordial admiration.
"You don't remember me?" he went on. "Well, that's quite natural, for of course you made a much deeper impression on me than I did on you!"
And then all at once it flashed across Katty who this pleasant, bright-eyed wayfarer must be. It must be, it could only be, Gilbert Baynton—the peccant Gillie!
"Mr. Baynton?" she said questioningly, and she also threw a great note of welcome and cordiality into her voice.