The deserted house was on the road; but the idea of spending
the night there was unendurable, and she meant to try to push on to
Hamblin, where she could sleep under a wood-shed if her strength should
fail her. Her preparations had been made with quiet forethought. Before
starting she had forced herself to swallow a glass of milk and eat a
piece of bread; and she had put in her canvas satchel a little packet of
the chocolate that Harney always carried in his bicycle bag. She wanted
above all to keep up her strength, and reach her destination without
attracting notice....
Mile by mile she retraced the road over which she had so often flown to
her lover. When she reached the turn where the wood-road branched off
from the Creston highway she remembered the Gospel tent--long since
folded up and transplanted--and her start of involuntary terror when
the fat evangelist had said: "Your Saviour knows everything. Come and
confess your guilt." There was no sense of guilt in her now, but only
a desperate desire to defend her secret from irreverent eyes, and
begin life again among people to whom the harsh code of the village was
unknown.
Pages:
223
224
225
226
227
228
229
230
231
232
233
234
235
236
237
238
239
240
241
242
243
244
245
246
247