The next day, however, a little note of gratitude came to Thresk through the post. It was unsigned and without any address. But it was in Stella Ballantyne's handwriting and the post-mark was Kurrachee. That she did not wish to see him he could quite understand; Kurrachee was a port from which ships sailed to many destinations; he could hardly set out in a blind search for her across the world. So here, it seemed, was that chapter closed. He took the next steamer westwards from Bombay, landed at Brindisi and went back to his work in the Law Courts and in Parliament. CHAPTER XIII LITTLE BEEDING AGAIN But though she disappeared Stella Ballantyne was not in flight from men and women. She avoided them because they did not for the moment count in her thoughts, except as possible hindrances. She was not so much running away as running to the place of her desires. She yielded to an impulse with which they had nothing whatever to do, an impulse so overmastering that even to the Reptons her precipitancy wore a look of ingratitude. She drove home with Jane Repton as soon as she was released, to the house on Khamballa Hill, and while she was still in the carriage she said: "I must go away to-morrow morning." She was sitting forward with a tense and eager look upon her face and her hands clenched tightly in her lap. "There is no need for that. Make your home with us, Stella, for a little while and hold your head high." Jane Repton had talked over this proposal with her husband. Both of them recognised that the acceptance of it would entail on them some little sacrifice. Prejudice would be difficult. But they had thrust these considerations aside in the loyalty of their friendship and Jane Repton was a little hurt that Stella waved away their invitation without ceremony. "I can't. I can't," she said irritably. "Don't try to stop me." Her nerves were quite on edge and she spoke with a greater violence than she knew. Jane Repton tried to persuade her. "Wouldn't it be wiser for you to face things here, even though it means some effort and pain?" "I don't know," answered Stella, still in the quick peremptory tone of one who will not be argued with. "I don't care either. I have nothing to do with wisdom just now. I don't want people at all. I want--oh, how I want--" She stopped and then she added vaguely: "Something else," and her voice trailed away into silence. She sat without a word, all tingling impatience, during the rest of that drive and continued so to sit after the carriage had stopped. When Jane Repton descended, and she woke up with a start and looked at the house, it was as though she brought her eyes down from heaven to earth. Once within the house she went straight up to Repton. He had left his wife behind with Stella at the Law Courts and had come home in advance of them. He had not spoken a word to Stella that day, and he had not the time now, for she began immediately in an eager voice and a look of fever in her eyes: