! I forgot you! You're tired? We'll turn back."

They retraced their steps, again passing Tower Cottage, into which its
occupants must have gone, for they were no longer to be seen.

"That name's on the tip of my tongue," said Mary in amused vexation. "I
shall get it in a moment!"

Cynthia had relapsed into gloom. "It doesn't matter in the least,"
she murmured.

"It's Beaumaroy!" said Mary in triumph.

"I don't wonder you couldn't remember that!"

CHAPTER II

THE GENERAL REMEMBERS

Amongst other various, and no doubt useful, functions, Miss Delia Wall
performed that of gossip and news agent-general to the village of
Inkston. A hard-featured, swarthy spinster of forty, with a roving,
inquisitive, yet not unkindly eye, she perambulated--or rather
percycled--the district, taking stock of every incident. Not a cat could
kitten or a dog have the mange without her privity; critics of her mental
activity went near to insinuating connivance. Naturally, therefore, she
was well acquainted with the new development at Tower Cottage, although
the isolated position of that dwelling made thorough observation
piquantly difficult. She laid her information before an attentive, if not
very respectful, audience gathered round the tea-table at Old Place, the
Naylors' handsome house on the outskirts of Sprotsfield and on the far
side of the heath from Inkston. She was enjoying herself, although she
was, as usual, a trifle distrustful of the quality of Mr. Naylor's smile;
it smacked of the satiric. "He looks at you as if you were a specimen,"
she had once been heard to complain; and, when she said "specimen," it
was obviously beetles that she had in mind.

"Everybody knows old Mr. Saffron--by sight, I mean--and the woman who
does for him," she said. "There's never been anything remarkable about
_them_. He took his walk as regular as clockwork every afternoon, and she
bought just the same things every week; her books must have tallied
almost to a penny every month, Mrs. Naylor! I know it! And it was a very
rare thing indeed for Mr. Saffron to go to London--though I have known
him to be away once or twice. But very, very rarely!" She paused and
added dramatically, "Until the armistice!"

"Full of ramifications, that event, Miss Wall. It affects even my
business." Mr. Naylor, though now withdrawn from an active share in its
conduct, was still interested in the large shipping firm from which he
had drawn his comfortable fortun