"Come, Frank!" Few men of forty would have resisted her at that moment.

Frank was twenty last birthday.

In other words, he threw aside his cigar, and followed her out of the greenhouse.
As he turned and closed the door--in the instant when he lost sight of her--his disinclination to be associated with the private theatricals revived.

At the foot of the house-steps he stopped again; plucked a twig from a plant near him; broke it in his hand; and looked about him uneasily, on this side and on that.

The path to the left led back to his father's cottage--the way of escape lay open.