"Then he has left Grindelwald finally?"
"I should think he has, and wisely too. Barton of the Fusiliers would have shot him if he had stayed. Luton Delayne's the kind of man who doesn't like playing tame pheasant. He gets out of the wood before the beaters are in. I shouldn't wonder if he is a hundred miles the other side of Pontarlier this morning."
"Wisdom in this case being the better part of valour—but is not this the hotel? I hope it is, for I am deadly tired, and thank you so much for your great kindness."
Benny said that the evening had been the best he had ever spent at Andana—and he meant it.
"I'm not staying at the Palace, you know," he ran on; "my brother and I took the chalet up by the Park. I come in to lunch and dinner, that's all. I'm not a sociable person, Mrs. Kennaird. Sometimes I think the best thing in life is being alone. But, of course, I didn't think that to-night. Will you let me bring you down from Vermala again? I hope so. It's been a happy opportunity for me, I assure you."
She smiled very sweetly and held out her hand. They were at the hotel door by this time, and Ian Kavanagh, hearing her voice, came forward with those expletives of apology which suited an unceremonious occasion. He was "most frightfully sorry," but how had he managed to miss her? The "little widow" declared as frankly that she did not know.
"I am a dreadful bungler," she said, with some reserve; "undoubtedly it was all my fault; please don't think any more about it, Mr. Kavanagh."
"Oh, but I couldn't help it—I shall dream about it all night."
"Then Dr. Orange must prescribe a sleeping draught for you," and with this for his consolation she left him and went to her room.
How foolish she had been; how poor her courage to persist in a foolish denial which might cost her so much.