"I ought to take you somewhere to get lunch," he said doubtfully,
looking at the crowds of people and then at his watch. "There's a train
in one hour that will let me catch a connection at midnight."
"Then I'll take you to the station," said Marcella promptly, and added
on impulse, "I'm a bit sorry I'm not coming with you, though. I'd have
liked to see my cousins--"
"I don't suppose you'd like them much. They are nothing like Rose. I
married an Australian, you know, and the girls are like her. They have
had very little schooling. They are good girls, very good girls, but
just a little hard," he sighed a little, and Marcella felt a quick pang
of regret for his loneliness. Obvious though it was that he did not want
her, she wished, for a moment, she could have gone with him to cheer his
solitude.
"But Ah Sing makes all the difference to me," he added hopefully. "He's
growing strawberries, and next week, I hope, we shall see the asparagus
peep through."
So she left him on the platform to dream of his sheep and Ah Sing his
only friend, while she dreamed of what next week would bring.
She felt it was almost impossible to wait to tell Louis the good news;
she wished she had arranged to meet him in the city; she wished all
sorts of things as she wandered, solitary, round the streets, feeling
very unsteady on her feet after so long on a buoyant floor, and
expecting the pavement to rock and sway at every step.
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