From behind the curtain she watched the maid go down the path, saw a few words pass between her and the stranger, and then the maid come back. She waited breathless.
"Yes, miss. It is a Mr. Cathcart. He said he would wait for you."
Maggie nodded.
"I will go," she said. "Remember, please do not say a word to anyone. It may be bad news, as I said."
* * * * *
As she walked through the hamlet three minutes later, she began to recognize that the news must be really serious; and that beneath all her serenity she had been aware of its possibility. So intense now was that anxiety--though perfectly formless in its details--that all other faculties seemed absorbed into it. She could not frame any imagination as to what it meant; she could form no plan, alternative or absolute, as to what must be done. She was only aware that something had happened, and that she would know the facts in a few seconds.
About fifty yards up the turning she saw the old gentleman waiting. He was in his London clothes, silk-hatted and spatted, and made a curiously incongruous picture there in the deep-banked lane that led upwards to the village. On either side towered the trees, still leafless, yet bursting with life; and overhead chattered the birds against the tender midday sky of spring.
He lifted his hat as she came to him; but they spoke no word of greeting.
"Tell me quickly," she said. "I am Maggie Deronnais."
He turned to walk by her side, saying nothing for a moment.
"The facts or the interpretation?" he asked in his brisk manner. "I will just say first that I have seen him this morning."
"Oh! the facts," she said. "Quickly, please."
"Well, he is going to Mr. Morton's chambers this afternoon; he says..."
"What?"
"One moment, please.... Oh! he is not seriously ill, as the world counts illness. He thought he was just very tired this morning. I went round to call on him. He was in bed at half-past ten when I left him. Then I came straight down here."
For a moment she thought the old man mad. The relief was so intense that she flushed scarlet, and stopped dead in the middle of the road.
"You came down here," she repeated. "Why, I thought--"
He looked at her gravely, in spite of the incessant twinkle in his eyes. She perceived that this old man's eyes would twinkle at a death-bed. He stroked his grey beard smoothly down.