She snatched up a wrap, for she did not mean to come back for a long while, perhaps not even to dinner—­it would be all Mr. Briggs’s fault if she went dinnerless and hungry—­and with another glance out of the window to see if she were still safe, she stole out and got away to the sheltering trees of the zigzag path, and there sat down on one of the seats placed at each bend to assist the upward journey of those who were breathless.

Ah, this was lovely, thought Scrap with a sigh of relief.  How cool.  How good it smelt.  She could see the quiet water of the little harbour through the pine trunks, and the lights coming out in the houses on the other side, and all round her the green dusk was splashed by the rose-pink of the gladioluses in the grass and the white of the crowding daisies.

Ah, this was lovely.  So still.  Nothing moving—­not a leaf, not a stalk.  The only sound was a dog barking, far away somewhere up on the hills, or when the door of the little restaurant in the piazza below was opened and there was a burst of voices, silenced again immediately by the swinging to of the door.

She drew in a deep breath of pleasure.  Ah, this was—­

Her deep breath was arrested in the middle.  What was that?

She leaned forward listening, her body tense.

Footsteps.  On the zigzag path.  Briggs.  Finding her out.

Should she run?

No—­the footsteps were coming up, not down.  Some one from the village.  Perhaps Angelo, with provisions.

She relaxed again.  But the steps were not the steps of Angelo, that swift and springy youth; they were slow and considered, and they kept on pausing.

“Some one who isn’t used to hills,” thought Scrap.

The idea of going back to the house did not occur to her.  She was afraid of nothing in life except love.  Brigands or murderers as such held no terrors for the daughter of the Droitwiches; she only would have been afraid of them if they left off being brigands and murderers and began instead to try and make love.

The next moment the footsteps turned the corner of her bit of path, and stood still.

“Getting his wind,” thought Scrap, not looking round.

Then as he—­from the sounds of the steps she took them to belong to a man—­did not move, she turned her head, and beheld with astonishment a person she had seen a good deal of lately in London, the well-known writer of amusing memoirs, Mr. Ferdinand Arundel.

She stared.  Nothing in the way of being followed surprised her any more, but that he should have discovered where she was surprised her.  Her mother had promised faithfully to tell no one.

“You?” she said, feeling betrayed.  “Here?”

He came up to her and took off his hat.  His forehead beneath the hat was wet with the beads of unaccustomed climbing.  He looked ashamed and entreating, like a guilty but devoted dog.