rrand, in those few breathless moments,
seemed no longer the errand of a fool.

"I can't realise it, even now," she went on, drawing her hand away at
last. "I pictured you at Westminster, in committee rooms and all sorts
of places. Aren't you forging weapons to drive us from our homes and
portion out our savings?"

"I have left the thunderbolts alone for one short week-end," he
answered. "I felt a hunger for this moorland air. London becomes so
enveloping." Jane sat upright upon her horse and looked at him with a
mocking smile. "How ungallant! I hoped you had come to atone for your
neglect."

"Have I neglected you?" he asked quietly, turning and walking by her
side.

"Shockingly! You lunched with me on the seventh of August. I see you
again on the second of November, and I do believe that I shall have to
save you from starvation again."

"It's quite true," he admitted. "I have a sandwich in my pocket,
though, in case you were away from home."

"Worse than ever," she sighed. "You didn't even trouble to make
enquiries."

"From whom should I? Robert--my servant--his wife, and a boy to help in
the garden are all my present staff at the Manor. Robert drives the car
and waits on me, and his wife cooks. They are estimable people, but I
don't think they are up in local news."

"You were quite safe," she said, looking ahead of her. "I am never
away." The tail end of a scat of rain beat on their faces. From the
hollow on their left, the wind came booming up.

"I should have thought that for these few months just now," he
suggested, "you might have cared for a change."

"I have my work here, such as it is," she answered, a little listlessly.
"If I were in town, for instance, I should have nothing to do."

"You would meet people. You must sometimes feel the need of society
down here."

"I doubt whether I should meet the people who would interest me," she
replied, "and in any case I have my work here. That keeps me occupied."

They turned into the avenue and soon the long front of the house spread
itself out before them. Jane, who had been momentarily absorbed, looked
down at her companion.

"You are alone at the Manor?" she asked.

"Quite alone."

She became the hostess directly they had passed the portals of the
house. She led him across the hall into her little sanctum.

"This is the room," she told him, "in which I never do a stroke of
work--sacred to the frivolities alone. I shall send Morton in to see
w