“If it is another thing I can do for you, it is.”
CHAPTER XX.
FUGITIVES.
“Maurice, it isn’t true! You are not sending us away and staying here yourself?”
“My dear Zoe, it’s the only thing to be done. But I foresee that my hair will be grey before it is done.”
“But don’t you see that when we have held out so long—— Oh, Maurice, we came for the sake of the cause, and we don’t want to forsake it when it has failed. We don’t mean to go away and be saved without you.”
“Don’t you think I know that? But when the only thing you can do for me is to go quietly——? There’s Con, you know. We couldn’t let the little chap be killed without trying to save him, could we? And you will have to help look after him, see that he doesn’t quite forget me, don’t you know?”
“I hate Eirene!” cried Zoe passionately.
“No, don’t say that. She is awfully cut up—didn’t realise how near we were to the end of all things, of course. I say, Zoe, you mustn’t visit this on her. It’s not her fault really, and I want you two to stick together. If you say to yourself—I mean, if you remember—if it occurs to you, don’t you know?—that I—I cared for her, perhaps it might make it easier.”
“It won’t, because she has treated you so shamefully.”
“At least she has promised to do the last thing I shall ask her, and you won’t.”