"Then--yes--you can do something for me. You can go away again."

"Are they out?" said Rokeby; "are they ill? What's the mystery?"

She looked up and down the road; she gave him the impression that she
stamped her feet and frowned, though to appearances she did neither.
She ordered:

"Don't loiter here. Osborn--Mr. Kerr'll be home directly, and if he
sees you he'll take you in, won't he?"

"Probably, I should say."

"Then come away."

"If I may walk a little way with you."

"I don't care where you walk with me," Julia replied vigorously, "if
it isn't into Marie's flat."

She set a brisk pace down the opposite side of the road, as if
assuming that Osborn might pass them unnoticing on the other, and
Rokeby kept step unprotestingly. "It must be after six o'clock," he
said presently.

"It is," she replied.

"Which is your way home?"

Julia described her route with a brevity characteristic of her.