The stations were few and far between and most desolate, improbable places as endings for Cicely Farmond's journey. He looked out of the window at each of them, but she never alighted.
"She's going to find herself stuck for the night. That's about the size of it," he said to himself as they left the last station before the journey ended.
Though their next stop was the final stop, he did not open the carriage door when the train pulled up. He did not even put his head far out of the window, only just enough to see what passed on the platform ahead.
"I'm not going to worry her if she doesn't need me," he said to himself.
He saw the slip of a figure in black talking to the stationmaster, and it was hardly necessary to hear that official's last words in order to divine what had happened.
"Weel, miss," he overheard the stationmaster say, "I'm sorry ye're disappointed, but it's no me that has stoppit the train. It's aff for the winter. If ye turn to the left ye'll fin' the hotel."
The girl looked round her slowly and it seemed to Ned that the way she did it epitomised disappointment and desolation, and then she hurried through the station buildings and was gone.
He was out of the carriage and after her in an instant. Beyond the station the darkness was intense and he had almost passed a road branching to the left without seeing it. He stopped and was going to turn down it when it struck him the silence was intense that way, but that there was a light sound of retreating footsteps straight ahead.
"She's missed the turning!" he said to himself, and followed the footsteps.
In a little he could see her against the sky, a dim hurrying figure, and his own stride quickened. He had never been in this place before, but he knew it for a mere seaboard village with an utterly lonely country on every inland side. She was heading into a black wilderness, and he took his decision at once and increased his pace till he was overhauling her fast.
At the sound of his footsteps he could see that she glanced over her shoulder and made the more haste till she was almost running. And then as she heard the pursuing steps always nearer she suddenly slackened speed to let him pass.
He could hear her gasp as she stopped short and turned sharply. She was staring hard now at the tall figure looming above her.