Martin?"

Martin corroborated.

"He see her, too," declared Hawkins with a sort of schoolboy naïveté.
"And he see her again four nights after. She give him a present--a
keepsake. He showed us. Then he seen her a third time, and--"

Hawkins ceased speaking and looked at the landlord as if mutely
appealing for his aid in making clear to me what occurred at this
third tryst with the mysterious "lady from London."

"Go on," prompted Martin. "Tell him. He's stopping here; he's all
right."

I keenly appreciated the compliment conveyed by this, the landlord's
longest speech of the evening, and raised my glass to him. "Well,
then," Hawkins resumed, "we didn't see him for a night or two, but on
the Wednesday--"

"The Thursday," corrected Martin.

"Right you are, Martin," agreed Hawkins--"the Thursday it were. I met
Farmer Hines comin' back from Wingham market as I came here mid-day.
It were the Thursday. Well, then, on the Thursday young Mr. Edward he
turns up after dark. Sort of slinked in he did. There was three or
four of us here, there was that night, wasn't there, Martin? 'Course
it were market day. Slinked in he did, and his face was like you see
it to-night only worse. He never said a word to nobody and nobody
never said nothin' to him, not likely. Just gulped down a double