Ninian spoke suddenly. "She isn’t going back if she doesn’t want to," he announced.
"But, my dear chap, what can she do?" cried Wolf.
"What do you want to do?" asked Ninian, standing over her.
She lifted her white face to his. Her knees were shaking under her, she was within an ace of sheer breakdown, but his unimpassioned coldness steadied her a little. "I want to go—home—to Bramforth!" she brought out. "Oh, please, please!"
"Miss Innes, anybody would tell you that you are not fit for a long cold journey," began Wolf, but Ninian pushed him aside.
"You really mean it?" he demanded of her. "You are determined not to go back to the Pele? You insist on leaving us?"
"Yes, yes," she faltered, bringing out her handkerchief and wiping the two drops which had overflowed her eyelids and lay on her white cheeks. "I must go. Can’t you see I must?"
He stared along the dim road as though he stared into the future.
"All right. I’ll take you to Raefell and see you into the train. There’s a through carriage on the 8.20, and you can get to Newcastle without changing." He turned to open the door of the car, adding, as she hesitated, "You can’t trust me even to do this?"
She yielded at that touch. She was wax in his hands. If he had caught her up in his arms, told her not to be silly, but to come back with him, she would have done it. Perhaps Wolf saw, and it may have been the reason why his fine lip curled as he looked at his brother rather contemptuously.
Miss Innes got into the car obediently. Ninian opened a bag which stood on the seat, and produced a thermos and a package of sandwiches. He poured out hot coffee and made her drink it. Then, wrapping the fur carriage rug warmly about her, he shut her in, took his place, with Wolf beside him, and they made best pace for Raefell.
She hardly knew what were her thoughts as they sped on. Probably she did not wholly trust Ninian, and was watchful to see whether he really would do as he promised. When they arrived in the pretty village, set among woods sloping to the river, they stopped before the inn, and Wolf dismounted, as it seemed to her, unwillingly.
"I will leave my brother to see you into the train," he said, coming to the window. "Good-bye. I am regretting every minute that your visit should have such a termination. It was doing my mother no end of good. Don’t you think, even now——"