Now they seemed to be saying to themselves that they
were sure it must be she.

Gwenda walked quickly away from them and disappeared through the
booking-office into the station yard.

And then Rowcliffe, who had apparently been hiding in the general
waiting-room, came out on to the platform.

The six fell upon him with cries of joy and affection.

They were his mother, his paternal uncle and aunt, his two youngest
cousins, and Dr. Harker, his best friend and colleague who had taken
his place in January when he had been ill.

They had all come down from Leeds for Rowcliffe's wedding.

* * * * *

Rowcliffe's trap and Peacock's from Garthdale stood side by side in
the station-yard.

Gwenda in Peacock's trap had left the town before she heard behind her
the clanking hoofs of Rowcliffe's little brown horse.

She thought, "He will pass in another minute. I shall see him."

But she did not see him. All the way up Rathdale to Morfe the sound of
the wheels and of the clanking hoofs pursued her, and Rowcliffe still
hung back. He did not want to pass her.

"Well," said Peacock, "thot beats mae. I sud navver a thought thot t'
owd maare could a got away from t' doctor's horse. Nat ef e'd a mind
t' paass 'er."

"No," said Gwenda. She was thinking, "It's Mary. It's Mary. How could
she, when she _knew_, when she was on her honor not to think of him?"

And she remembered a conversation she had had with her stepmother two
months ago, when the news came. (Robina had seized the situation at a
glance and she had probed it to its core.)

"You wanted him to marry Ally, did you? It wasn't much good you're
going away if you left him with Mary."

"But," she had said, "Mary knew."

And Robina had answered, marvelously. "You should never have let her.
It was her knowing that did it. You were three women to one man, and
Mary was the one without a scruple. Do you suppose she'd think of Ally
or of you, either?"

And she had tried to be loyal to Mary and to Rowcliffe. She had said,
"If we _were_ three, we all had our innings, and he made his choice."

And Robina, "It was Mary did the choosing."

She had added that Gwenda was a little fool, and that she ought to
have known that though Mary was as meek as Moses she was that sort.

She went on, thinking, to the steady clanking of the hoofs.

"I suppose," she said to herself, "she couldn't help it."

The lights of Morfe shone through the November