Mrs Plummer had to think so.
"I'm sure that if you told me you meant to start in ten minutes for the North Pole, you'd find me willing; that is, if you'd be willing to take me with you."
"Oh, I'd be willing to take you, so long as you don't even hint at a disinclination to be taken."
They stayed in Paris for two days. Then they wandered hither and thither in Switzerland. Everywhere, it seemed, there were too many people.
"I want to be alone," declared Miss Arnott. "Where there isn't a soul to speak to except you and Evans,"-- Evans was her maid--"you two don't count. But I can't get away from the crowds; they're even on the tops of the mountains. I hate them."
Mrs Plummer sighed; being careful, however, to conceal the sigh from Miss Arnott. It seemed to her that the young lady had an incomprehensible objection to everything that appealed to anyone else. She avoided hotels where the cooking was decent, because other people patronised them. She eschewed places where there was something to be obtained in the way of amusement, because other reasonable creatures showed a desire to be amused. She shunned beauty spots, merely because she was not the only person in the world who liked to look upon the beauties of nature. Having hit upon an apparently inaccessible retreat, from the ordinary tourist point of view, in the upper Engadine, where, according to Mrs Plummer, the hotel was horrible, and there was nothing to do, and nowhere to go, there not being a level hundred yards within miles, the roads being mere tracks on the mountain sides, she did show some disposition to rest awhile. Indeed, she showed an inclination to stay much longer than either Mrs Plummer or Evans desired. Those two were far from happy.
"What a young lady in her position can see in a place like this beats me altogether. The food isn't fit for a Christian, and look at the room we have to eat it in; it isn't even decently furnished. There's not a soul to speak to, and nothing to do except climb up and down the side of a wall. She'll be brought in one day--if they ever find her--nothing but a bag of bones; you see if she isn't!"
In that strain Evans frequently eased her mind, or tried to.
To this remote hamlet, however, in course of time, other people began to come. They not only filled the hotel, which was easy, since Miss Arnott already had most of it, and would have had all, if the landlord, who was a character, had not insisted on keeping certain rooms for other guests; but they also overflowed into the neighbouring houses. These newcomers filled Miss Arnott with dark suspicions. When indulging in her solitary expeditions one young man in particular, named Blenkinsop, developed an extraordinary knack of turning up when she least expected him.
"I believe I'm indebted to you for these people coming here."