"I—I was only hurrying," she replied lamely.
"Have you been to see the President?"
"I didn't see her. It was too late," answered Molly evasively.
They walked on in silence for a moment.
"I am going down to the village for a long-distance message. May I see you to your door on my way?" he asked.
"Oh, yes," said Molly, half inclined to confide to the Professor that she had just overheard his conversation. But a kind of shyness closed her lips. They began talking of other things, chiefly of the little Japanese, Molly's pupil.
At the door of Queen's, the Professor took her hand and looked down at her kindly.
"You were frightened at something," he said, smiling gravely. "Confess, now, were you not?"
"There was nothing to frighten me," she answered. "Did you ever see a picture," she continued irrelevantly, "a photograph in a gilt frame on a little table in the President's drawing room? It's a picture of a slender girl in an old-fashioned black dress. Her hair is dark and her face is rather pale-looking."
"Oh, yes. That's a photograph of Miss Elaine Walker, President Walker's sister."