"Are you going out? Where are you going?"
Siegmund stood still and looked at her.
"She is frightened," he said to himself, smiling ironically.
"I am only going a walk. I have to go to Wimbledon. I shall not be very long."
"Wimbledon, at this time!" said Vera sharply, full of suspicion.
"Yes, I am late. I shall be back in an hour."
He was sorry for her. She knew he gave her an honourable promise.
"You need not keep us sitting up," she said.
He did not answer, but hurried to the station.
_Chapter 26_
Helena, Louisa, and Olive climbed the steps to go to the South-Western platform. They were laden with dress-baskets, umbrellas, and little packages. Olive and Louisa, at least, were in high spirits. Olive stopped before the indicator.
"The next train for Waterloo," she announced, in her contralto voice, "is 10.30. It is now 10.12."
"We go by the 10.40; it is a better train," said Helena.
Olive turned to her with a heavy-arch manner.
"Very well, dear. There is a parting to be got through, I am told. We sympathize, dear, but we regret it. Starting for a holiday is always a prolonged agony. But I am strong to endure it."
"You look it. You look as if you could tackle a bull," cried Louisa, skittish.
"My dear Louisa," rang out Olive"s contralto, "don"t judge me by appearances. You"re sure to be taken in. With me it"s a case of
""Oh, the gladness of her gladness when she"s sad, And the sadness of her sadness when she"s glad!""
She looked round to see the effect of this. Helena, expected to say something, chimed in sarcastically:
""They are nothing to her madness--""
"When she"s going for a holiday, dear," cried Olive.
"Oh, go on being mad," cried Louisa.
"What, do you like it? I thought you"d be thanking Heaven that sanity was given me in large doses."
"And holidays in small," laughed Louisa. "Good! No, I like your madness, if you call it such. You are always so serious."
""It"s ill talking of halters in the house of the hanged," dear," boomed Olive.
She looked from side to side. She felt triumphant. Helena smiled, acknowledging the sarcasm.
"But," said Louisa, smiling anxiously, "I don"t quite see it. What"s the point?"
"Well, to be explicit, dear," replied Olive, "it is hardly safe to accuse me of sadness and seriousness in _this_ trio."
Louisa laughed and shook herself.
"Come to think of it, it isn"t," she said.
Helena sighed, and walked down the platform. Her heart was beating thickly; she could hardly breathe. The station lamps hung low, so they made a ceiling of heat and dusty light. She suffocated under them. For a moment she beat with hysteria, feeling, as most of us feel when sick on a hot summer night, as if she must certainly go crazed, smothered under the grey, woolly blanket of heat. Siegmund was late. It was already twenty-five minutes past ten.
She went towards the booking-office. At that moment Siegmund came on to the platform.
"Here I am!" he said. "Where is Louisa?"
Helena pointed to the seat without answering. She was looking at Siegmund. He was distracted by the excitement of the moment, so she could not read him.
"Olive is there, too," she explained.
Siegmund stood still, straining his eyes to see the two women seated amidst pale wicker dress-baskets and dark rugs. The stranger made things more complex.
"Does she--your other friend--does she know?" he asked.
"She knows nothing," replied Helena in a low tone, as she led him forward to be introduced.
"How do you do?" replied Olive in most mellow contralto. "Behold the dauntless three, with their traps! You will see us forth on our perils?"
"I will, since I may not do more," replied Siegmund, smiling, continuing: "And how is Sister Louisa?"
"She is very well, thank you. It is _her_ turn now," cried Louisa, vindictive, triumphant.
There was always a faint animosity in her bearing towards Siegmund. He understood, and smiled at her enmity, for the two were really good friends.
"It is your turn now," he repeated, smiling, and he turned away.
He and Helena walked down the platform.
"How did you find things at home?" he asked her.
"Oh, as usual," she replied indifferently. "And you?"
"Just the same," he answered. He thought for a moment or two, then added: "The children are happier without me."
"Oh, you mustn"t say that kind of thing protested Helena miserably.
"It"s not true."