‘You are, perhaps, a partner in the Williamson Company?’
‘Not a partner,’ he said.
It may be explained here that the aforesaid Williamson Company had supplied Lord Dolmer with his motor-car. Richard had visited their office in order to ascertain if, by chance, Mr. Raphael Craig was a customer of theirs, and had been told that he was, and, further, that there was an electric car then on order for him. It was a matter of but little difficulty for Richard to persuade Williamson’s manager to allow him to pose for a few days as an employe of the company, and to take the car up to Hockliffe himself. He foresaw that in the rôle of a motor-car expert he might gain a footing at Craig’s house which could not be gained in any other way.
When the two cars had been attached, and the journey—necessarily a slow one—began, a rather desultory conversation sprang up between Richard and Miss Craig, who sat by his side in the leading car.
‘You, too, must have miscalculated your distances,’ she said suddenly, after they had discussed the remarkable beauty of the moon.
‘No,’ he said, ‘I like travelling at night. I admit that I thought Hockliffe considerably further on. I expected to deliver the car about breakfast-time.’
‘You will permit us to offer you a bed?’ she said. ‘You will be able to get at least five hours’ sleep. We breakfast at seven. It is early, but that is my father’s custom.’
He thanked her.
‘Take the little road on the right,’ she directed him later. ‘It leads only to our house In Ireland we call such a road a boreen.’
It was then that he noted a faint Irish accent in her voice.