“The City of Dreadful Night,” she murmured at last. “I can’t ever seem to get used to it.” She heard his light laugh and the sound of it comforted her. “Jolly murky, isn’t it? I miss that fireworks Johnny pourin’ whiskey over by Waterloo Bridge--and Big Ben. Doesn’t seem like London. All rot anyway.” “You don’t think there’s danger,” she asked cautiously. He hesitated a moment before replying. And then, “No,” he said, “not now.” Silence fell over them again. It was as though a shape sat between, a phantom of her dead hopes and his, something so cold and tangible that she drew away in her own corner and looked out at the meaningless blur of the sleeping city. Her lips were tightly closed. She had given him his chance to speak, but he had not spoken and every foot of road that they traversed seemed to carry them further apart. The end of their journey--! Was it to be the end ... of everything between them? After a while that seemed interminable she heard his voice again. “I suppose you think I’m an awful rotter.” She turned her head and tried to read his face, but he kept it away from her, toward the opposite window. The feeling that she had voiced to Betty Heathcote of wanting to “mother” him came over her in a warm effusion. “Nothing that you can _say_ to me will make me think you one, Cyril,” she said gently. “Thanks awf’ly,” he murmured. And after a pause, “I am though, you know.” She leaned forward impulsively and laid a hand on his knee. “No. You’re acting strangely, but I know that there’s a reason for it. As for your being a coward”--she laughed softly--“it’s impossible--quite impossible to make me believe that.” He laid his fingers over hers for a moment. “Nice of you to have confidence in a chap and all that, but appearances are against me--that’s the difficulty.” “Why are they against you? Why should they be against you? Because you--” She stopped, for here she felt that she was approaching dangerous ground. Instead of parleying longer, she used her woman’s weapons frankly and leaning toward him put an arm around his neck and compelled him to turn his face to hers. “Oh, Cyril, won’t you tell me what this mystery is that is coming between us? Won’t you let me help you? I want to be in the sunlight with you again. It can’t go on this way, one of us in the dark and the other in the light. I have felt it for weeks. When I spoke to you tonight about going to France it was in the hope that you might give me some explanation that would satisfy me. My heart is wrapped up in the cause of England, but if the German blood in you is calling you away from your duties as an Englishman, tell me frankly and I will try to forgive you, but don’t let the shadow stay over us any longer, Cyril. I must know the truth. What is the mystery that hangs over you and makes----”