“It was awfully nice of you.”

“There was nothing else,” I said, “to do.”

“You’re coming with me to Canterbury.”  She stated it.

“No, my dear child,” I said, “I am not.  You don’t want them to think you went to Bruges with me.”

This was by implication a reference to Jevons.  It was as near as I had let myself get to him.

She said, “What are you going to do, then?”

“I’m going to put you on the boat at Ostend, and then I’m coming back here.”

It must have been at this point that the garcon brought the coffee.  For I remember our sitting out there and drinking it amicably until the aroma of it gave Viola an idea.

“What time shall we have to start to-morrow?”

I said, “First thing in the morning.”

“Then,” she said, “it does seem a pity not to send for Jimmy.”

I could see now that there was some deadly purpose in her persistence.  But this time I couldn’t bear it, and I lost my temper.

I said, “Send for him.  Send for him, if you can’t live ten minutes without him.”

I was sorry even at the time; I have been ashamed since.  For, so far from resenting my abominable rudeness—­as, under any conclusion, she had a perfect right to—­she merely said, “I’m only thinking that if I’ve got to go so soon to-morrow it’ll be horribly lonely for him over there.”

“He doesn’t expect to see you.  We arranged all that.”

She pondered it, still with that curious absence of resentment.  It was as if, recognizing the danger of the situation, she submitted to any steps, however disagreeable, that were necessary for her safety.  It was clear that she trusted me; less clear that she trusted Jevons.

One thing remained mysterious to her.

“What are you coming back here for?” she asked.

I let her have it straight:  “To look after Jevons.”

“What do you suppose he’d do?”

“He might get into England before your brother got out of it.”

She smiled. "What do you suppose, then, Reggie’d do?"

I said I knew what I’d do if I were Reggie.

She smiled again.  “I see.  You’re saving him from Reggie.”

“I’m not thinking of him, I can assure you.”

At that she said, “Dear Wally, so you think you’re saving me.”

“I’m trying to,” I said.  “As far as your people are concerned.  You don’t want them to know you’ve been here.  If you’ll only leave it to me, they won’t know.”

“I’m not going to lie about it.  I shall tell them if they ask me.”

“Not Reggie,” I said.

“Yes, Reggie.  If he asks me.  Reggie’s the very last person I should think of lying to.”

It was this attitude of hers that first shook me in my conclusions.  For
I’m afraid I’d come to certain very definite conclusions.

Why, I asked her, hadn’t she told them before she came?