“You see,” said Wayne, rubbing his hands before the flames, “all the comforts of home were to be had for the trouble of a telephone message. Ah, look at that!”
A snow-storm had sprung into being without the snow’s usual tentative experiments, and the wind was driving a feathery cloud across the landscape. At the ravine’s edge below the veranda a few scarlet leaves clung bravely to the sumac bushes, their colour flaming in the whirling snow. Mrs. Craighill turned with a contented little sigh from the windows to the room’s comfort and cheer. Their adventure, too, gained fresh quality from the sense of security communicated by the handsome room. Rosedale was a small and exclusive organization which, even at its busiest season, gave its members almost the seclusion of a private house. Mrs. Craighill left the fire to inspect some of the etchings on the walls and came back to the seat Wayne placed for her at the table, shivering from her plunge into the arctic circle that lay beyond the reach of the fire.
“There doesn’t seem to be anybody else here; is it really all our very own?”
“Do you want me to answer yes or no?” he laughed. “You saw the caretaker; he’s always here and he has a wife around somewhere. We are chaperoned, if that’s what you mean.”
“But other people might come at any time. Do you think anybody else is as perfectly deliciously crazy as we are?”
She surveyed the table with satisfaction and began filling the tea-pot from the kettle that hummed over the alcohol flames.
“Well, if anyone comes we won’t let them in—that’s all! Possession is ten points of the law in this case. I thought of it first and anybody else will be treated as an intruder.”
“But at the rate it’s snowing we may never get home!”
“Well,” he said, nibbling a sandwich, “why should we?”
“There is that question, of course! You will have tea, won’t you?”