“Nonsense,” said Duke. “Of course I’ll take you back, and then I’ll stroll this way again and meet you and Philippa on your return,” he added to Mr Gresham.
Philippa opened her lips as if about to remonstrate, but before she had time to speak Bernard broke in.
“Don’t say you are tired too, Miss Raynsworth. I had set my heart on showing you the fish-ponds. The woods there are in perfection at this time of year.”
“I am not tired,” said Philippa, quietly. “Perhaps it is the best thing to do. Be sure you rest well, Evey, for there’s the walk home to consider.”
“Oh, no, you must let me send you back, of course,” said Mr Gresham. “Au revoir, then,” and the quartet separated.
Philippa and her host walked on some little way in silence. Both, though neither fully realised it for the other, were making up their minds to a decided step. For the last few days had made the girl resolve that if circumstances combined to render her doing so possible, she would tell Mr Gresham the facts of the travesty she had since so bitterly regretted. And if anything had been wanting to confirm her in this decision, Michael Gresham’s arrival would have done so.
But the task before her was far from an easy one. Independently of her own not unnatural shrinking from the subject, there was the terror lest in volunteering this confidence she should appear prematurely to take for granted any special interest in her affairs on the part of her companion; any right, so to say, on his side, to know all details of her life. How could she broach the subject?
She glanced at him; he was not looking at her, but gazing before him with a preoccupied expression. And in some degree to her relief, just as she was nervously clearing her throat to begin to speak, he suddenly turned towards her.
“We have still fully a mile before we get to the fish ponds,” he said, “but I do not think we need walk quite as fast as we are doing.”
Philippa slackened her pace without speaking.