She consulted again the map on the other side of the railway carriage, flanked by pictures of Whitby Abbey and Scarshaven shore. She could trace there the railway straggling up the coast past Scarshaven, Aunby and Flying-fall, before it branched inland again to Follerwick. Only one more station separated her from Connie. It was surprising how little Muriel had thought about her for the past four months. The news of Godfrey's disaster had wiped her sister as completely from her mind as a sponge erases writing from a slate, and even the later information that the disaster was less terrible than she had feared had not so much recalled the Thraile family to Muriel as it had recalled Muriel to Marshington. Mrs. Neale had heard of Godfrey. His wound was a slight one, and the worst consequence of his prison life seemed to be an exasperating but tolerably safe boredom which at least might save his life until the end of the war. That was a vast relief. It had enabled Muriel to face with greater equanimity the post-girl's rap at the door, and the soft flutter of letters into their wire cage; but at the time when Muriel heard it she was racked by another anxiety that engrossed her mind and body. Mrs. Hammond had caught influenza. She began with it one morning early in November and continued to have it badly for about six weeks. "She has got thoroughly run down—seems to have been worrying. You ought to take care of her, you know," said Dr. Parker; and Muriel, who considered that she had done nothing else for the past twelve years, thought this a little hard. Nor was Mrs. Hammond easy to nurse. When Muriel brought her Benger's food, she wanted Bovril, and when Muriel brought her Bovril, then she didn't think that she really could eat anything just then. For three weeks Muriel nursed her night and day, sleeping in her father's dressing-room, or rather lying there in drowsy apprehension waiting for her mother's call.
And now she was better, and Christmas was over, and Muriel was being carried in the train to Thraile. Connie had responded to her offer without enthusiasm, she thought; but Connie's letters never were particularly indicative of her feelings. Her handwriting did not adapt itself to lucid analysis. Yet a secret apprehension drew Muriel from Marshington into this bleak country where everything was just a little sinister, and therefore where anything might happen.
The rain rattled now against the window. It flooded out the landscape, leaving for Muriel's eyes only a blurred line of horizon and for her ears the howling of the wind. Sound rather than sight gave to Muriel her first impression of the Follerwick moors.
The train came to a standstill with a grinding scream of brakes. Muriel pulled her suit-case from the rack, buttoned her fur collar more tightly, and wrestled with the door. The wind caught it from her and almost hurled her out on to the platform. She staggered out into the driving rain. For a moment she stood bewildered, facing a short stretch of wooden platform, a deserted shelter, and the grim pile of the moors beyond, hill after hill shouldering up into a melting sky.
The wind flung itself upon her like a fury and almost tore her suit-case from her hand.
Then, just when she was beginning to wonder whether this could possibly be a station, Connie bore down upon her; Connie wrapped in a great man's mackintosh, her dripping arms outstretched, her cheeks wet and her eyes shining through the rain.
"Oh, here you are! Good old Mu! By Jove, it's good to see you!"
She enfolded Muriel with a damp but unequivocal embrace.
"Oh, Connie," shouted Muriel reproachfully; she had to shout because of the wind and the rain. "You shouldn't have come. This awful day!"
Connie laughed, and Muriel was glad of her laugh. It seemed to loosen the tight feeling of doubt and fear that ever since her father's illness had bound her chest uncomfortably.