eyond a vast waste of tumbling waters unlit by any sun. Not a tree
broke that melancholy wilderness, nor any living thing but ourselves.
The horse went stumblingly under the incessant stimulation of the
driver's lash and tongue....

"Yonder it is," said my man, pointing with his whip, and I twisted
round to see over his shoulder, not the Rhine-like castle I had
expected, but a long low house of stone upon a headland, backed by a
distant mountain that vanished in a wild driven storm of rain as I
looked. But at the sight of Mirk my lassitude passed, my nerves
tightened, and my will began to march again. Now, thought I, we bring
things to an issue. Now we come to something personal and definite. The
vagueness is at an end. I kept my eyes upon the place, and thought it
more and more like a prison as we drew nearer. Perhaps from that window
Mary was looking for me now. Had she wondered why I did not come to her
before? Now at any rate I had found her. I sprang off the car, found a
bell-handle, and set the house jangling.

The door opened, and a little old man appeared with his fingers thrust
inside his collar as though he were struggling against strangulation. He
regarded me for a second, and spoke before I could speak.

"What might you be wanting?" said he, as if he had an answer ready.

"I want to see Lady Mary Justin," I said.

"You can't," he said. "She's gone."

"Gone!"

"The day before yesterday she went to London. You'll have to be getting
back there."

"She's gone to London."

"No less."

"Willingly?"

The little old man struggled with his collar. "Anyone would go
willingly," he said, and seemed to await my further commands. He eyed me
obliquely with a shadow of malice in his eyes.

It was then my heart failed, and I knew that we lovers were beaten. I
turned from the door without another word to the janitor. "Back," said I
to my driver, and got up behind him.

But it is one thing to decide to go back, and another to do it. At the
little station I studied time-tables, and I could not get to England
again without a delay of half a day. Somewhere I must wait. I did not
want to wait where there was any concourse of people. I decided to stay
in the inn by the station for the intervening six hours, and get some
sleep before I started upon my return, but when I saw the bedroom I
changed my plan and went down out of the village by a steep road towards
the shore. I wandered down through the rain and spindrift