"And that woman might have had her for daughter!" he said to himself,
divining in her the rebuff of some deep and tender instinct.
Marsham came back.
"The ambulance is just arriving."
Sir James nodded, and turned toward the house. Marsham detained him,
dropping his voice.
"Let me go with him, and you take my fly."
Sir James frowned.
"That is all settled," he said, peremptorily. Then he looked at Diana.
"I will see to everything in-doors. Will you take Miss Mallory into
the garden?"
Diana submitted; though, for the first time, her face reddened faintly.
She understood that Sir James wished her to be out of sight and hearing
while they moved the dead.
That was a strange walk together for these two! Side by side, almost in
silence, they followed the garden path which had taken them to the
downs, on a certain February evening. The thought of it hovered, a ghost
unlaid, in both their minds. Instinctively, Marsham guided her by this
path, that they might avoid that spot on the farther lawn, where the
scattered chairs, the trampled books and papers still showed where Death
and Sleep had descended. Yet, as they passed it from a distance he saw
the natural shudder run through her; and, by association, there flashed
through him intolerably the memory of that moment of divine abandonment
in their last interview, when he had comforted her, and she had clung to
him.
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