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“What’s happened about . . . the case?”

“Nothing. No one has heard anything further from Mrs. Holmes. I suppose it will come on later.”

“You take it very calmly.”

“I dread it terribly, but I try not to think about it. I’m working hard, and I know that here in Wairiri there are a few people at least who are prepared to believe the best of me.”

“If they saw you here—now—with me, they mightn’t be so sure.”

“No . . . They mightn’t.”

“Why did you come?”

She was letting the dry sand run through her fingers, and she did not answer at once.

“Because I’m weak, I suppose,” she said at last. “I’m rather lonely, and I wanted to see you, and talk to you.”

He caught her hand and held it. Then he laid his face down against it, as he had done that day when he said he loved her.

“No,” she said quietly. “I don’t want you to do that. You’ve made it clear that marriage isn’t possible for us, and I’ve come to see that you are right. But we can still be friends, Rodney, as long as we don’t mix up friendship with . . . with anything else.”

He released her hand, and sat up. She hesitated for a moment, and then she said:

“Can’t you tell me why you’re unhappy?”

“I don’t know. Nothing seems worth while. I gamble—but I don’t care whether I win or lose.”

“I wish you’d promise to live more...more steadily.”

“Why? What does it signify? I’m not responsible to any one for the way I live.”