instinct of local postilions and local horses; and instinct had proved
wrong.

The travellers alighted, and were ushered into a not
uncomfortable-looking parlour; very low as to the ceiling, very
old-fashioned as to the furniture, but spotlessly clean, and enlivened
by a good fire, to which his lordship drew near, shivering and muttering
discontentedly to himself.

'We might be worse off,' said her ladyship, looking round the bright
little room, which pleased her better than many a state apartment in the
large hotels at which they had stopped.

'Hardly, unless we were out on the moor,' grumbled her husband. 'I am
sick to death of this ill-advised, unreasonable journey. I am at a loss
to imagine your motive in bringing me here. You must have had a motive.'

'I had,' answered Lady Maulevrier, with a freezing look. 'I wanted to
get you out of the way. I told you that plainly enough at Southampton.'

'I don't see why I should be hurried away and hidden,' said Lord
Maulevrier. 'I must face my accusers, sooner or later.'

'Of course. The day of reckoning must come. But in the meantime have you
no delicacy? Do you want to be pointed at everywhere?'

'All I know is that I am very ill,' answered her husband, 'and that this
wretched journey has made me twenty years older.'

'We shall be safe at home before noon to-morrow, and you can have Horton