"The Palace Hotel."
What ho! She must have some money.
"May I walk back with you?"
"Oh, thanks," said Joanna—"it ain't far."
They walked, rather awkwardly silent, the few hundred yards to the hotel. Joanna stopped and held out her hand. She suddenly realized that she did not want to say good-bye to the young man. Their acquaintanceship had been most shockingly begun—Ellen must never know—but she did not want it to end. She felt, somehow, that he just meant to say good-bye and go off, without any plans for another meeting. She must take action herself.
"Won't you come and have dinner—I mean lunch—with me to-morrow?"
She scanned his face eagerly as she spoke. It suddenly struck her what a terrible thing it would be if he went out of her life now after having just come into it—come back into it, she had almost said, for she could not rid herself of that strange sense of Martin's return, of a second spring.
But she need not have been afraid. He was not the man to refuse his chances.
"Thanks no end—I'll be honoured."
"Then I'll expect you. One o'clock, and ask for Miss Godden."