"And they must know I'm going on the road to-morrow; the eleven-thirty train!"
"Exactly. They're well informed." Kane had been passing up and down; now he stopped in front of Christina and again he seemed to measure her with his keen eyes. "Well!" he said; "are you game for it?"
Christina sprang up and stood before him, glowing.
"You'll keep this appointment?"
"Surely! And alone!"
"Not by a long shot! Your mother and Mr. Ingham have feared exactly some such escapade; that's why you've had to be shadowed all this while and not advised of the activities of the police. There will be plenty of plain clothes men, well planted. But not you, Mr. Herrick, whom they would know. If you attempt to smuggle yourself in, we'll have to put you in irons. Well, Miss Hope?"
"My mother," said Christina, rising, and faintly smiling, "deserves to have her hair turn as white as I'm sure it has by this time." She held out her hand. "You gave me a great fright," she said. "Did you know it? I thought you had all come to execute me. Don't! I'm not worth it!"
The admiration which no man could withhold from her for very long colored Kane's studying face and warmed his handshake. "I can count on your not losing your head, I think. You'll be there?"
"I'll be there.—But have these people really any secret? Are they really going to tell me something?"
"Well, my dear young lady, we'll know that to-morrow."