They turned and walked the length of the platform side by side. The train was in the station, and passengers were leisurely selecting their seats. From the door of the booking-office as they came opposite to it, among a hurrying group of late arrivals, Mrs Lawless emerged, tall and composed and very pale, with a cluster of early roses, fresh gathered with the dew still on them, drooping in her hands. A servant accompanied her carrying luggage. It was evident that she too was going by the train. The Colonel was the first to see her; Hayhurst in his preoccupation had eyes for no one. He stopped, regarded her in surprise, and raised his hat. "Mrs Lawless!" he exclaimed. "You! ... Surely you are not thinking--" She looked him steadily in the eyes. "I am going to Kraaifontein, Colonel Grey," she interrupted him--"to find my husband." It was not often that the Colonel was startled beyond all power of lucid expression, but in the extremity of his amazement words failed him. "Your--Eh?" he said, and stood still on the platform and stared at her. He felt a touch on his arm. "Unless you want to be left behind, you'd better take your seat." Tom Hayhurst stood at his elbow, his blue eyes on the woman's face, with a mingling of respect in them and wondering resentment. He hurried them to the train, opened the door of an empty carriage, and shut it on them with a bang. "Send me a wire," he said. The Colonel thrust his head out of the window. "You're not coming?" "No." The young man gave an expressive glance in the direction of Mrs Lawless, seated in the far corner of the carriage with the fragrant drooping flowers in her lap. "Grit wouldn't thank us for making a picnic, or a funeral party, of it with her there," he said. Colonel Grey understood. "I'll let you know immediately," he promised, and sank back on the cushions, taking off his hat and mopping his much perplexed and perspiring brow as the train moved slowly out. He looked across at Mrs Lawless. She was gazing out of the window at the sunny country as it swept past her view with eyes that saw nothing consciously, and with thoughts, he rightly conjectured, far away from her surroundings. He tried to think of her in this new connection that she had sprung on him so suddenly and for which he had been so wholly unprepared; tried, but failed to remember, what Lawless had said in respect of his relationship with her that had so entirely misled him. He recalled that he had asked point blank whether he was a connection of hers, recalled too the ambiguous answer to his question: "By marriage only." Truly a man may usually be said to be related to his wife by marriage only. But the answer had been given with intent to deceive. And Lawless had said other things that had tended to turn his mind from any such suspicion. For private reasons he had desired to conceal the fact of his marriage.