ent incarnate, like a creature with some very
deep illusion shattered. It was horrible! Then, feeling that she could
not stay still, must walk, run, get away somehow from this feeling of
treachery and betrayal, she sprang up. All was quiet below, and
she slipped downstairs and out, speeding along with no knowledge of
direction, taking the way she had taken day after day to her hospital.
It was the last of April, trees and shrubs were luscious with blossom
and leaf; the dogs ran gaily; people had almost happy faces in the
sunshine. 'If I could get away from myself, I wouldn't care,' she
thought. Easy to get away from people, from London, even from England
perhaps; but from oneself--impossible! She passed her hospital; and
looked at it dully, at the Red Cross flag against its stucco wall, and
a soldier in his blue slops and red tie, coming out. She had spent many
miserable hours there, but none quite so miserable as this. She passed
the church opposite to the flats where Leila lived, and running suddenly
into a tall man coming round the corner, saw Fort. She bent her head,
and tried to hurry past. But his hand was held out, she could not help
putting hers into it; and looking up hardily, she said:

"You know about me, don't you?"

His face, naturally so frank, seemed to clench up, as if he were riding
at a fence. 'He'll tell a lie,' she thought bitterly. But he did not.

"Yes, Leila told me."

And she thought: 'I suppose he'll try and pretend that I've not been a
beast!'

"I admire your pluck," he said.

"I haven't any."

"We never know ourselves, do we? I suppose you wouldn't walk my pace a
minute or two, would you? I'm going the same way."

"I don't know which way I'm going."

"That is my case, too."

They walked on in silence.

"I wish to God I were back in France," said Fort abruptly. "One doesn't
feel clean here."

Noel's heart applauded.

Ah! to get away--away from oneself! But at the thought of her baby, her
heart fell again. "Is your leg quite hopeless?" she said.

"Quite."

"That must be horrid."

"Hundreds of thousands would look on it as splendid luck; and so it is
if you count it better to be alive than dead, which I do, in spite of
the blues."

"How is Cousin Leila?"

"Very well. She goes on pegging away at the hospital; she's a brick."
But he did not look at her, and again there was silence, till he stopped
by Lord's Cricket-ground.

"I mustn't keep you crawling along at this pace.