"What's the matter now?" asked the doctor.
"The men have begun to measure the ground, and that stupid Jones came running open-mouthed to the house with the news, and my lady heard him," explained Parkins. "I'd not have told her: if people held their tongues, the sheds might be built, and up, and she never know it. I thought she'd have gone out of her mind, sir; and then Mr. Oswald Cray came in, and he talked to her. I think she's calmer now; I heard her talking quietly to Mr. Oswald Cray before he left. But she says she'll go off by rail to Mr. Low's."
"Yes, sir. So well, to be sure, as she was this morning!" continued Parkins, drying her tears. "I don't know when she has been in such spirits, and all because Mr. Cray was coming home tonight with his wife. The fancy she has taken for him is extraordinary: she has been counting the days off since he was away, like a schoolgirl counts them off before her holidays?"
Dr. Davenal entered. He did not attempt to reason Lady Oswald out of the visit to Mr. Low. Quite the contrary. He told her the short trip by rail would do her good: and he thought, which he did _not_ tell her, that the interview with Mr. Low might set the affair at rest sooner than anything else would, by convincing her that there could be no appeal against the fiat, no delay in the carrying out of the work.
When Lady Oswald reached the station, it happened that Oswald Cray was there. He was emerging from one of the private rooms with some plans under his arm when he saw her. She looked scared at the bustle of the station, and was leaning helplessly on her maid's arm, uncertain where to go, what to do. Oswald hastened to her and took her on his arm. Parkins slipped behind, quite thankful to see him: she was as little used to the ways and confusion of a station as her mistress.
"Will you venture still, Lady Oswald, with all this turmoil?"
"Will you cease worrying me!" she answered, and the tone was a sharp one, for she fancied he still wished to stop her, and resented the intermeddling with her will.
_Did_ he wish to stop her? If any such feeling was upon him, it must surely have been instinct: a prevision of what the ill-fated journey would bring forth; of the influence it would indirectly bear on his own future life.