"Too late. I am not a child any more."
Then throwing her soft arms round his neck, she clung to him, saying the most adorable and poignant things, dissolved, indeed, in a murmuring anguish of remorse; until, with the same unexpectedness as before, she again disengaged herself—urging, insisting that he should send her away.
"Let me go and live at Haggart, baby and I." (Haggart was one of the Tranmore "places," recently handed over to the young people.) "You can come and see me sometimes. I'll garden—and write books. Half the smart women I know write stories—or plays. Why shouldn't I?"
"Why, indeed? Meanwhile, madam, I take you to Scotland—next week."
"Scotland?" She pressed her hands over her eyes. "'Anywhere—anywhere—out of the world!'"
"Kitty!" Startled by the abandonment of her words, Ashe caught her hands and held them. "Kitty!—- you regret—"
"That man? Do I?" She opened her eyes, frowning. "I loathe him! When I think of yesterday, I could drown myself. If I could pile the whole world between him and me—I would. But"—she shivered—"but yet—if he were sitting there—"
"You would be once more under the spell?" said Ashe, bitterly.
"Spell!" she repeated, with scorn. Then snatching her hands from his, she threw back the hair from her temples with a wild gesture. "I warned you," she said—"I warned you."
"A man doesn't pay much attention to those warnings, Kitty."