"All the same, what a pity you didn't come before the bird was flown!" Elsie suggested with the sole idea of gaining time.
"It's something to have found Aintree at home," Nigel returned.
"And you're going to arrest him for harbouring my sister?" Elsie walked into the hall and stood with her fingers on the handle of the door. Her heart was beating so fast that she felt sure she must be betraying emotion in her face. There was only one way of saving the Seraph, and she had resolved to take it. That it involved the immediate and irrevocable sacrifice of her reputation did not disturb her: she was filled with pity and doubt—pity for Sylvia, and doubt whether Nigel would accept her sacrifice. "I suppose—you're quite certain—he wasn't harbouring—me?"
Nigel's unimaginative mind hardly weighed the possibility.
"There's no warrant against you."
"Fortunately not."
"Then why should he harbour you?"
Elsie waited till her lips and voice were under control. Then she turned away from Sylvia and faced him with the steadiness of desperation.
"It's a very wicked world, Mr. Rawnsley."
There was a moment's silence: then Sylvia leapt to her feet with cheeks aflame.