; I thought she would never finish. While she was
drinking, the clock of Owlscombe Church struck twelve. I distinctly
remember counting the strokes. From that moment I positively recollect
nothing till I saw you here by my side."

"The name! If it had been any other horse he'd have had a broken neck!"
murmured Melbury.

"'Tis wonderful, sure, how a quiet hoss will bring a man home at such
times!" said John Upjohn. "And what's more wonderful than keeping your
seat in a deep, slumbering sleep? I've knowed men drowze off walking
home from randies where the mead and other liquors have gone round
well, and keep walking for more than a mile on end without waking.
Well, doctor, I don't care who the man is, 'tis a mercy you wasn't a
drownded, or a splintered, or a hanged up to a tree like Absalom--also
a handsome gentleman like yerself, as the prophets say."

"True," murmured old Timothy. "From the soul of his foot to the crown
of his head there was no blemish in him."

"Or leastwise you might ha' been a-wownded into tatters a'most, and no
doctor to jine your few limbs together within seven mile!"

While this grim address was proceeding, Fitzpiers had dismounted, and
taking Grace's arm walked stiffly in-doors with her. Melbury stood
staring at the horse, which, in addition to being very weary, was
spattered with mud. There was no mud to speak of about the Hintocks
just now--only in the clammy hollows of the vale beyond Owlscombe, the
stiff soil of which retained moisture for weeks after the uplands were
dry. While they were rubbing down the mare, Melbury's mind coupled
with the foreign quality of the mud the name he had heard unconsciously
muttered by the surgeon when Grace took his hand--"Felice." Who was
Felice? Why, Mrs. Charmond; and she, as he knew, was staying at
Middleton.

Melbury had indeed pounced upon the image that filled Fitzpiers's
half-awakened soul--wherein there had been a picture of a recent
interview on a lawn with a capriciously passionate woman who had begged
him not to come again in tones whose vibration incited him to disobey.
"What are you doing here? Why do you pursue me? Another belongs to you.
If they were to see you they would seize you as a thief!" And she had
turbulently admitted to his wringing questions that her visit to
Middleton had been undertaken less because of the invalid relative than
in shamefaced fear of her own weakness if she remained near his home.
A triumph then it w