He had told Kate he
would come to the station and see her comfortably off; but, indeed, she
had seen all the luggage into the van, and the servant into another
carriage, and bought her own magazines and ensconced herself comfortably
in an empty first-class compartment before there was a sign of him. But
then he came, and with a vengeance. She saw him, red-faced with
hurrying, come striding along the platform, a Gladstone bag in his hand,
plainly looking for her. She waved to him and he seized on a guard to
unlock her door for him.

"You'll be carried on,--quick, quick, get out!" she gasped, for the bell
was ringing.

But he had dropped comfortably on to the seat opposite to her, after
putting his portmanteau on the rack.

"I'm coming, too," he said.

"You're not," she cried,--"you can't,--I shan't be ready for you;
there'll be no breakfast. Get out immediately, Hugh, and don't be so
foolish." She actually dragged at his coat to pull him up from his seat.

But then the train gave a jerk, and she recognized the matter was out of
her hands.

"Well, of all the wild doings!" she said; "you really might be twenty
again, Hugh, and going off to England at two days' notice with your very
socks undarned."

"I wish I were," he said, and ruefully smoothed a bald patch on the top
of his head.

"But--but--you don't realize things a bit. I haven't ordered
anything,--the very beds aren't made,--there won't be a meal fit to eat
for at least two days." Kate looked as nearly put out as a stout,
bright-faced woman of forty-five could look.

"I'll sleep on a sofa," he said, good-humouredly.

"It will have to be made up," she snapped, or tried to snap.

"Very well, I'll sleep under it."

"And what about breakfast? Well, you will simply have to go to the hotel
till I'm ready for you."

"I'll go to no hotel," he said; "I'm sick of them. I'll have half of
your breakfast."

"A boiled egg and bread, and the possibility of no butter," she said
scornfully.

"A boiled egg and bread, and the possibility of no butter be it," he
answered.

"But what on earth induced you to do such a mad thing?" she persisted.

He rubbed his chin thoughtfully.

"I think it was chiefly because the beggar wouldn't propose," he said.

"What are you talking about, you mad boy?"

"You see," he said, "he was a decent fellow--I'd quite spread myself on
him, and she was no end of a girl, quite the best I've done. And I'd got
him right up to the fenc