But it's late--much later than we arranged, Hewet." He was slightly annoyed, and in his capacity as leader of the expedition, inclined to be dictatorial.

He spoke quickly, using curiously sharp, meaningless words.
"Being late wouldn't matter normally, of course," he said, "but when it's a question of keeping the men up to time--" He gathered them together and made them come down to the river-bank, where the boat was waiting to row them out to the steamer.
The heat of the day was going down, and over their cups of tea the Flushings tended to become communicative.

It seemed to Terence as he listened to them talking, that existence now went on in two different layers.

Here were the Flushings talking, talking somewhere high up in the air above him, and he and Rachel had dropped to the bottom of the world together.

But with something of a child's directness, Mrs.
Flushing had also the instinct which leads a child to suspect what its elders wish to keep hidden.