visibly disturbed. "No, no, of
course I don't. I really don't know what I meant. It's all too
confusing for simple people like you and me. Let's talk about
something else." Lucy, to whom the matter was distasteful, agreed; but
the thought persisted. Mistaken ... and "the less you say...!"

CHAPTER X

AT A WORLD'S EDGE

It was after that queer look, after her too conscious blush that she
began to envisage the state of her affairs. She was going to Martley
Thicket for Whitsuntide; it was an old engagement, comparatively old,
that is; she did want to go, and now she knew that she did. Well, how
much did she want to go? Ought she to want it? What had happened?

Questions thronged her when once she had opened a window. What did it
matter to her whether Urquhart qualified as an aviator or not? What
had made her ask him not to do it? How had she allowed him to say
"Assume that you like me"? The short dialogue stared at her in red
letters upon the dark. "Assume that you like me--" "You may assume
it." "I do." She read the packed little sentences over and over, and
studied herself with care. No, honestly, nothing jarred. There was no
harm; she didn't feel any tarnish upon her. And yet--she was looking
forward to Martley Thicket with a livelier blood than she had felt
since Easter when James had kissed her in the shrouded garden. A
livelier blood? Hazarding the looking-glass, she thought that she
could detect a livelier iris too. What had happened? Well, of course,
the answer to that question was involved in another: how much was she
to assume? How much did Urquhart like her? She hoped, against
conviction, that she might have answered these questions before she
met him again--which would probably be at Martley. Just now, stoutly
bearing her disapproval, he was doubtless at Byfleet or elsewhere
risking his neck. She answered a question possibly arising out of this
by a shrewd smile. "Of course I don't disapprove. He knows that. I
shiver; but I know he's perfectly right. He may be sure." The meeting
at Martley would, at the very least, be extremely interesting. She
left it there for the moment.

But having once begun to pay attention to such matters as these, she
pursued her researches--in and out of season. It was a busy time of
year, and James always laid great stress on what he called "the duties
of her station." She must edge up crowded stairways behind him, stand
at his side in hot and humming rooms where the he