Rapidly, as one well used to them, she made her way through the shrubbery paths; round the walled garden, and behind the gardeners' cottages. She heard the children in Mrs. Cresson's cottage as she passed, Lily still fretfully crying, and the old woman's voice scolding. Poor children!—they would be horribly frightened—but nothing worse.
The thick overgrown wood of fir and beech behind the cottages received her, swallowed up the slight insignificant form. In the wood there was still light enough to let her grope her way along the path, till at the end, against an opening to the sky, she saw the outlines of a keeper's hut. Then she knew that she was worn out, and must rest. She pushed the door ajar, and sat crouching on the threshold, while the schemes and plottings of the preceding weeks ran disjointedly through memory.
Marion was safe by now—she had had an hour's start. And Eliza too had gone. Nothing could be better than the arrangements made for those two.
But she herself was not going—not yet. Her limbs failed her; and beyond the sheltering woods, she seemed to become electrically aware of hostile persons, of nets drawn round her, cutting off escape. As to that, she felt the most supreme indifference to what might happen to her. The indifference, indeed, passed presently into a strange and stinging temptation to go back—back to the dark house—to see with her own eyes what her hands had done. She resisted it with difficulty…. Suddenly, a sound from the distance—beyond the cottages—as of a slight explosion. She started, and throwing back her veil, she sat motionless in the doorway of the hut, her face making a dim white patch upon the darkness.
Chapter XX
"Take me home!—take me home quick! I want to talk to you. Not now—not here!"
The car flew along. Mark barely looked at Delia. His face was set and pale. As for her, while they ran through the village and along the country road between it and Maumsey, her mind had time to adjust itself to that flashing resolution which had broken down a hundred scruples and swept away a hundred fears, in that moment on the hill when she had met his eyes, and the look in them. What must he think of her? An assignation with that man, on the very first afternoon when his tender watchfulness left her for an hour! No, it could not be borne that he should read her so! She must clear herself! And thought, leaping beacon-like from point to point told her, at last, that for Gertrude too, she had chosen wrongly. Thank Heaven, there was still time! What could a girl do, all alone—groping in such a darkness? Better after all lay the case before Mark's judgment, Mark's tenderness, and trust him with it all. Trust her own power too—see what a girl could do with the man who loved her!
The car stopped at the Abbey door, and Winnington, still absolutely silent, helped her to alight. She led the way, past the drawing-room where Lady Tonbridge sat rather anxiously expecting her, to that bare room on the ground floor, the little gun-room, which Gertrude Marvell had made her office, and where many signs of her occupation still remained—a calendar on the wall marking the "glorious" dates of the League—a flashlight photograph of the first raid on Parliament some years before—a faded badge, and scattered piles of newspapers. A couple of deal tables and two chairs were all the furniture the room contained, in addition to the cupboards, painted in stone-colour, which covered the walls.
Delia closed the door, and threw off her furs. Then, with a gesture of complete abandonment, she went up to Winnington, holding out her hands—
"Oh, Mark, Mark, I want you to help me!"