‘But Bridget is a woman!’ said a dreamy voice beside him.

Sarratt laughed; but he was launched on recollections and could not stop himself.  Apparently everybody in his company was a hero, and had deserved the Military Cross ten times over, except himself.  He described some incidents he had personally seen, and through the repressed fire with which he spoke, the personality and ideals of the man revealed themselves—­normal, strong, self-forgetting.  Had he even forgotten the little creature beside him?  Hardly, for instinctively he softened away some of the terrible details of blood and pain.  But he had forgotten Nelly’s prohibition.  And when again they had entered the dark wood which lay between them and the cottage on the river-bank, suddenly he heard a trembling breath, and a sob.

He caught her in his arms.

‘Nelly, darling!  Oh, I was a brute to talk to you like this.’

‘No,’ she said, struggling with herself—­’No!  Wait a moment.’  She lay against him trembling through every limb, while he kissed and comforted her.

‘I’m—­I’m not a coward, George!’ she said at last, gasping,—­’I’m not indeed.  Only—­well, this morning I had about a hundred and seventy hours left—­I counted them.  And now there are fifteen less.  And all the time, while we talk, they are slipping away, so quick—­so quick—­’

But she was regaining self-control, and soon released herself.

‘I won’t do it again!’ she said piteously, in the tone of a penitent child.  ‘I won’t indeed.  Let’s go home.  I’m all right.’

And home they sped, hand in hand, silently.  The little room when they re-entered it was bright with firelight, because kind Mrs. Weston had thought the flight chilly, and the white table laid out for them—­its pretty china and simple fare—­tempted and cheered them with its look of home.  But Nelly lay on the sofa afterwards very pale, though smiling and talking as usual.  And through the night she was haunted, sleeping and waking, by the image of the solitary boat rocking gently on the moonlit lake, the water lapping its sides.  She saw herself and George adrift in it—­sailing into—­disappearing in—­that radiance of silver light.  Sleepily she hoped that Sir William Farrell would not forget his promise.

CHAPTER III

May I come in?’

Nelly Sarratt, who was standing beside the table in the sitting-room, packing a small luncheon-basket with sandwiches and cake, looked up in astonishment.  Then she went to the door which was slightly ajar, and opened it.

She beheld a very tall man standing smiling on the threshold.

’I hope I’m not disturbing you, Mrs. Sarratt—­but I was on my way for a day’s sketching, and as my car passed your house, I thought I would like to bring you, myself, the permission which I spoke of on Saturday.  I wrote yesterday, my friend was away from home but I got a telegram this morning.’