CHAPTER XXV.
When Maggie sped away from Cedar Crest in the low seat of the roadster beside the happy Dick, she felt herself more of a criminal than at any time in her life, and a criminal that miraculously was making her escape out of an inescapable set of circumstances.
Beyond her relief at this escape she did not know these first few minutes what she thought or felt.

Too much had happened, and what had happened had all turned out so differently from what she had expected, for her to set in orderly array this chaos of reactions within herself and read the meaning of that afternoon's visit.

She managed, with a great effort, to keep under control the outer extremities of her senses, and thus respond with the correct "yes" or "no" or "indeed" when some response from her was required by Dick's happy conversation.
Near Roslyn they swung off the turnpike into an unfrequented, shady road.

Dick steered to one side beneath a locust-tree and silenced the motor.
"Why are you stopping ?" she asked in sudden alarm.
"So we can talk without a piece of impertinent machinery roaring interruptions at us," replied Dick with forced lightness.

And then in a voice he could not make light: "I want to talk to you about--about my sister.