"Come along!" he said, slapping a cane against his leg.
"David ...!" she exclaimed in astonishment at his tone.
His brows contracted and he became very still.
"Look here, Sonia," he said. "Let's clear away romance and come to grips. Possibly you don't know that, if I'd been caught on Austrian territory, I should have been shot——"
"I do. It's just that ..."
"Don't interrupt! There's a war on, and your father's been mobilized, so that I came in his place. From now until we get back to England you will obey whatever orders I choose to give you. First of all, what's the latest game you've been up to?"
Sonia stared at him in amazement. He was lying negligently back in his corner with his feet stretched out on the seat, drawling his words in a tone that a half-caste might use to a dog. She kept her lips tightly shut until he rapped the window menacingly with his knuckles.
"If you talk to me like that, David ..." she began.
He laughed derisively and watched her angry, flushed face until she turned and looked out of the window to avoid his eyes.
No other word was spoken. As the train wound its way in and out of the mountains, afternoon changed to evening, and the low-flung last shaft of sunlight showed her that O'Rane's eyes were closed and his lips smiling. Sonia became suddenly frightened, as though he were laughing at her in his sleep. Turning away, she closed her own eyes, but the stifling August heat parched her mouth and set the skin of her body pricking.