"This is a great misfortune, sir, for me," said my host. "I have lived honest all my days. There is no one in the house who would steal; on that I would stake my life. I can make nothing of it."
"Mr. Featherstone is quite recovered from his ague," said I slowly. I crossed over to the empty fireplace heaped with the white ashes of the logs which had blazed there the night before.
"The fire no doubt did him some benefit."
"That is precisely what I was thinking," said I, and I knelt down on the hearth-rug and poked amongst the ashes with the shovel. Suddenly, the landlord uttered an exclamation and threw up the window. I heard the clatter of a horse's hoofs upon the road. I got up from my knees and rushed to the window. As I leaned out Mr. Featherstone rode underneath and he rode my horse.
"Stop!" I shouted out.
"Mr. Berkeley," he cried, airily waving his hand as he rode by, "you may hold very good putt cards, but you haven't kept your horse."
"You damned thief!" I yelled, and he turned in his saddle and put out his tongue. It is, if you think of it, a form of repartee to which there is no reply. In any case I doubt if I could have made any reply which would have reached his ears. For he had set the horse to a gallop and was far down the road.
I went back to the hearth where the landlord joined me. We both knelt down and raked away the ashes.
"What's that?" said I, pointing to something blackened and scorched. The landlord picked it up.
"It is a piece of corduroy."