“I, of course, thought that she had wished you good-bye, and made an appointment for another meeting,” Lucie said. “In fact, both my father and myself were greatly surprised when she came and asked that the horse might be put to. And yet—” and without finishing her sentence, she looked mysteriously into my face.
“And yet what?” I asked.
For a few moments she was silent, hesitating to explain. I saw by her face that something had puzzled her. We had so quickly become friends, and our friendship had been cemented by our mutual acquaintanceship with Ella Murray, that we had found ourselves speaking perfectly frankly as though we had known each other for years.
“Well—will you pardon me for asking you a rather impertinent question, Mr Leaf?” she said.
“Why, certainly.”
“You’ll perhaps think me curiously inquisitive, but how long were you with Ella in the avenue after you left last night?”
“About half an hour.”
“Not more?”
“No. I can fix it, because I noted the time by that long grandfather clock in the hall as we went out, and I looked at my watch when I got back to the inn. I was three-quarters of an hour in getting back to Studland.”
“That’s rather strange,” she remarked, with a distinct note of suspicion in her voice.