‘Are you going far, Horace?’

’To Bournemouth again,—­for the present.  I’ve given up these rooms, and I’m taking all my things away.  In a month or two I may go abroad; but I’ll let you know.’

Already he was out of the room; his sister had no choice but to follow him downstairs.  He looked so ill, and behaved with such lack of self-restraint, that Nancy kept her eyes upon him in an awestricken gaze, as though watching some one on the headlong way to destruction.  Pouring rain obliged her to put up her umbrella as she stepped down on to the pavement.  Horace, having shouted a direction to the driver, entered the cab.

‘You haven’t even shaken hands with me, Horace,’ Nancy exclaimed, standing at the window.

’Good-bye, dear; good-bye!  You shouldn’t have come in weather such as this.  Get home as fast as you can.  Good-bye!—­Tell the fellow to drive sharp.’

And the cab clattered away, sending spurts of mud on to Nancy’s waterproof.

She walked on for a few paces without reflection, until the vehicle disappeared round a corner.  Coming to herself, she made for the railway again, which was at only a few minutes’ distance, and there she sat down by the fire in the waiting-room.  Her health for the last year had been sound as in the days of girlhood; it was rarely that she caught cold, and weather would have been indifferent to her but for the discomfort which hindered her free movement.

Vexed at so futile a journey, she resolved not to return home without making another effort to learn something about Horace.  The only person to whom she could apply was the one who would certainly be possessed of information,—­Mrs. Damerel.  At the time of Horace’s engagement, Nancy had heard from Mrs. Damerel, and replied to the letter; she remembered her aunt’s address, and as the distance was not great, the temptation to go there now proved irresistible.  Her husband would dislike to hear of such a step, but he had never forbidden communication with Mrs. Damerel.

By help of train and omnibus she reached her new destination in half-an-hour, and felt a relief on learning that Mrs. Damerel was at home.  But it surprised her to be conducted into a room where lamps were burning, and blinds drawn close; she passed suddenly from cheerless day to cosy evening.  Mrs. Damerel, negligently attired, received her with a show of warm welcome, but appeared nervous and out of spirits.

‘I am not very well,’ she admitted, ’and that’s why I have shut out the dreadful weather.  Isn’t it the most sensible way of getting through the worst of a London winter?  To pretend that there is daylight is quite ridiculous, so one may as well have the comforts of night.’

‘I have come to speak about Horace,’ said Nancy, at once.  In any case, she would have felt embarrassment, and it was increased by the look with which Mrs. Damerel kept regarding her,—­a look of confusion, of shrinking, of intense and painful scrutiny.