here, leaning back and, as she
thought, rather queer, he still waited. She came down to him and he
continued to offer his ineffectual intention of pleasantry. "Yes, I've
chosen," she said to him. "I'll let her go if you--if you--"

She faltered; he quickly took her up. "If I, if I--"

"If you'll give up Mrs. Beale."

"Oh!" he exclaimed; on which she saw how much, how hopelessly he was
afraid. She had supposed at the cafe that it was of his rebellion, of
his gathering motive; but how could that be when his temptations--that
temptation for example of the train they had just lost--were after all
so slight? Mrs. Wix was right. He was afraid of his weakness--of his
weakness.

She couldn't have told you afterwards how they got back to the inn: she
could only have told you that even from this point they had not gone
straight, but once more had wandered and loitered and, in the course of
it, had found themselves on the edge of the quay where--still apparently
with half an hour to spare--the boat prepared for Folkestone was drawn
up. Here they hovered as they had done at the station; here they
exchanged silences again, but only exchanged silences. There were
punctual people on the deck, choosing places, taking the best; some of
them already contented, all established and shawled, facing to England
and attended by the steward, who, confined on such a day to the lighter
offices, tucked up the ladies' feet or opened bottles with a pop. They
looked down at these things without a word; they even picked out a good
place for two that was left in the lee of a lifeboat; and if they
lingered rather stupidly, neither deciding to go aboard nor deciding to
come away, it was Sir Claude quite as much as she who wouldn't move. It
was Sir Claude who cultivated the supreme stillness by which she knew
best what he meant. He simply meant that he knew all she herself meant.
But there was no pretence of pleasantry now: their faces were grave and
tired. When at last they lounged off it was as if his fear, his fear of
his weakness, leaned upon her heavily as they followed the harbour. In
the hall of the hotel as they passed in she saw a battered old box that
she recognised, an ancient receptacle with dangling labels that she knew
and a big painted W, lately done over and intensely personal, that
seemed to stare at her with a recognition and even with some suspicion
of its own. Sir Claude caught it too, and there was agitation for both
of them in th