of leaving him?"

She moaned. "You fool--you fool--that's _why_ I'm thinking of it."

She pressed her hands to her eyes as if she shut back the sight of him.

"You aren't thinking of it," I said. "You haven't left him. You've only
been for a good long walk to Fittleworth, and we've come to fetch you
back in the car."

"Haven't I told you that I can't and won't use Jimmy's car?"

"You can't use it to run away from him in; but you can very well use it
to go back to him."

"I'm not going back to him," she said. "Can't you see that I've burnt my
boats?"

"You may have burnt the old ones, Viola," I said. "But you can build
new."

"You must give me time, Wally. It'll take a long time. And you don't
understand me. I _want_ to get away from Jimmy. That's why I'm going away
now, while he isn't there. That's what I mean by burning my boats.
If I go back to him--if I see him--I shall never get away. I shan't have
the courage. I shall just crumple up with the first sight of him--with
the first word he says--"

"Why not," I said, "crumple up?"

She lifted her head as I had seen her lift it before.

"Because," she said, "I wish to be straight."

I asked her if running away behind Jimmy's back was her idea of
straightness? To which she replied that _my_ rectitude was excruciating
and that I'd twist anything to a moral purpose, but it was twisting all
the same. Couldn't I see that _the_ awful thing would be to come sneaking
back and pretend to Jimmy that she hadn't run away from him?--If that was
my idea of straightness she was sorry for me.

I said, "My dear child, you must see that running away by yourself is one
thing, and running away with Charlie Thesiger is another. It would be all
very well if Charlie hadn't got into that train."

She wanted to know what that mattered when she had got out of the train?
I suggested that the people who saw Charlie get in hadn't seen her get
out, and that she must look at the thing as it appeared to other people.

"Look," I said, "at the facts. Mrs. Jevons walks to Selham Station for
the London train. Captain Thesiger joins her there, presumably by
pre-arrangement, leaving by Midhurst station so that they may not be seen
going away together. She is, however, seen entering his compartment at
Selham. At Fittleworth she is seized with prudence and with panic. She is
seen getting out on to the platform. And she is seen two hours later
following the Captain up to London by the next tra