“Mrs. Barrimore and Mr. Burns have gone for a walk on the sea-front,” she explained. “I stayed to finish ‘Uther and Igraine’—and to see you.”
“How nice of you!” exclaimed Dan, much flattered, for Phyllis had shown no coquetry at all in these golden days when sight had come back.
“I want to know so much what you think of Miss Le Breton,” went on Phyllis.
The words acted as a cold douche after Dan’s elation. Phyllis was not anxious to see him (for himself) at all. She wanted to satisfy her curiosity about Miss Le Breton. A swift thought crossed Dan’s mind. Could it be possible that Phyllis’s visits to the bungalow, of which he had heard, were not platonic after all? Could it be that she was in love with the egotist at Gissing, and was fearful lest that young man should come to be enamored of Aimée Le Breton?
Dan was not inclined to agree with Mrs. Barrimore regarding the extreme frankness of Colonel Lane’s attractive little daughter. But he liked her genuinely, and it had gratified him that she had said she had waited to see him, till she gave her reason.
“Won’t you take cold in that thin blouse, Miss Lane?” was Dan’s next remark.
Phyllis had met Dan at the gate of the carriage drive, and they had paced slowly towards the house as they talked.
“I never take cold,” asserted Phyllis, “but I will go in and get my coat and hat, and we can go a little way to meet Mrs. Barrimore and Mr. Burns if you like—not, of course, if you are tired after walking from Gissing.”
Dan put his big shoulders back and asked if he looked like a creature that tired.
In the twilight that had gathered Dan looked a giant to little Phyllis.