"Perhaps it ain't too late. Perhaps you can do something."
"What has happened?" asked Marise, making her voice sharp and imperative
to pierce the other's agitation.
"I don't know. I don't know," sobbed Agnes. "She didn't come down for
breakfast. I went up to see . . . oh, go quick! Go quick!"
She went down, half on the bench, half on the ground.
Marise and Marsh stood for an instant, petrified.
There was only the smallest part of Marise's consciousness which was
alive to this. Most of it lay numbed and bewildered, still hearing, like
a roll of thunder, the voice of Vincent Marsh.
Then she turned. "Look out for her, will you," she said briefly. "No,
don't come with me. I'll go by the back road. It's the quickest, but
it's too narrow for a car. You drive to Ashley and bring the doctor in
your car."
She ran down the path and around the house to the road, not feeling the
blinding heat of the sun. She ran along the dusty road, a few steps from
the house before the turn into the narrow lane. She felt nothing at all
but a great need for haste.
As she ran, putting all her strength into her running, there were
moments when she forgot why she was hurrying, where she was going, what
had happened; but she did not slacken her pace. She was on the narrow
back road now, in the dense shade of the pines below the Eagle Rocks.
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