Page:Herbert Jenkins - The Rain Girl.djvu/71

 of his ideas. The open road no longer seemed to attract him. Hitherto it had appeared the only thing that mattered; now into all his plans and projects the Rain-Girl seemed to precipitate herself.

Try as he might, he found it impossible to develop a scheme for the future from which she was excluded. A few weeks previously his one idea in life had been to get away from the London that jarred so upon his nerves. He could not breathe in its heavy, smoky atmosphere, he had told himself, and he had longed for the quiet of the countryside, where he could think and, mentally, put his house in order. Now everything was changed. Why? It seemed to have become a world of "Whys."

Convalescence to him could not mean the going away to some quiet spot where his health might be completely restored. It meant a definite and active campaign in search of this girl; yet he had seen her only twice. It was all so strange, so bewildering. Time after time he asked himself what she had thought of his conduct in not keeping the implied appointment for breakfast. Had she decided that he had forgotten, or overslept himself? He had learned that it was nearly eleven on that unfortunate second of May before his condition was discovered by the chambermaid.

Of course it did not matter to the Rain-Girl, he told himself. By now, in all probability, she had forgotten his very existence; but for himself, well, find her he would, even if he had to search London as the girl in history had done for her lover. He