It was Janet who had heard the hum of Stowell's car on the drive and had come hurrying out to meet him.
"You've had a tiring day—I can see that," she said, as she poured out a cup of tea for him. "Ah, these high positions! 'There's nothing to be got without being paid for,' as your father used to say."
To escape from Janet's solicitude and to tire himself out so that he might have a chance of sleeping that night, he walked down to the shore.
A storm was rising. The gulls were flying inland and their white wings were mingling with the black ones of the rooks. The fierce sky to the south, the cold grey of the sea to the north, the bleak church tower on the stark headland, looking like a blinded lighthouse—they suited better with his mood.
Fenella! She must know everything by this time. How was he to meet her eyes in the morning?
Gell! He, too, must know everything now. How every innocent thing he had done to help his friend would look like cunning bribery and cruel treachery!
It was a lie to say that a sin could be concealed. An evil act once done could never be undone; it could never be hidden away. A man might carry his sin out to sea, and bury it in the deepest part of the deep, but some day it would come scouring up before a storm as the broken seaweed came, to lie open and naked on the beach.
The sky darkened and he turned back. On the way home he met Robbie Creer, and they had to shout to each other above the fury of the wind. The farmer had been over to the Nappin (the fields above the Point) and found hidden fissures in the soil three feet deep. They would lose land before morning.
At dinner Janet did her best to make things cheerful. There was the sweet home atmosphere—the wood fire with its odour of resin and gorse, the snow-white table-cloth, the silver candlesticks, all the old-fashioned daintiness. But Stowell was preoccupied and hardly listened to Janet's chattering. So she went early to her room, saying she was sure he wished to be alone—his father always did, during the adjournment of a serious case. His father again! How her devotion to his father drove the iron into his soul!
It was late and the rain had begun to slash the window-panes when he heard the front door bell ringing. After a few moments he heard it ringing again, more loudly and insistently. Nobody answered it. The household must be asleep.