To Barbara the whole speech had sounded nightmarish. She quite failed to realize that Mr Questing thought on these standardized lines and spoke his commonplaces from a full heart. It was the first experience of its kind that she had endured, and he seemed to her a terrible figure, half-threatening, half-amorous. When she forced herself to look up and saw him in his smooth pale suit, himself pale, slightly obese and glistening, and found his eyes fixed rather greedily upon hers, her panic mounted to its climax, and she thought: ‘I shan’t like to refuse. I must get away.’ She noticed that his expensive watch chain was heaving up and down in an agitated rhythm about two feet away from her nose. She sprang to her feet and, as if she had released a spring in Mr Questing, he flung his arms about her. During the following moments the thing she was most conscious of was his stertorous breathing. She brought her elbows together and shoved with her forearms against his waistcoat. At the same time she dodged the face which thrust forward repeatedly at hers. She thought: ‘This is frightful. This is the worst thing that has ever happened to me. I’m hating this.’ Mr Questing muttered excitedly: ‘Now, now, now,’ and they tramped to and fro. Barbara tripped over the camp stool and rapped her shin. She gave a little yelp of pain.

And upon this scene came Simon and Dikon.

II

Gaunt had announced that he would do no work after all and Dikon, released from duty, decided to go for a walk in the direction of the Peak. He had an idea that he would like to see for himself the level crossing and the bridge where Smith had his escape from the train. He found Simon and asked him to point out the short cut to the Peak road. Simon, most unexpectedly, offered to go with him. They set out together along the path that ran past the springs and lake. They had not gone far before they heard a confused trampling and a sharp cry. Without a word but on a single impulse, they ran forward together and Barbara was discovered in Mr Questing’s arms.