"Yes. I was never here before and——" the pathetic note sounded in her rich, low voice, "I'll be very grateful, sir, if you will advise me where to go."
"Why—haven't you friends in Ippingford?" asked Horatio in surprise.
The girl shook her head and her dark eyes rested on the curate with such an expression of sadness and sweet resignation that he felt inexpressibly touched.
"My dear young lady," he said in ready sympathy, "my dear Miss—er——" he paused to give her an opportunity to tell him her name, but this was precisely what the adroit young woman was not yet prepared to do. She was not sure what name to give him.
Miss Thompson knew her as Jenny Regan, the name she had given to the police, and it was in pursuit of Miss Thompson (and her golf bag) that she had come to Ippingford. On the other hand, various newspapers had chronicled the fact that a young woman named Jenny Regan was implicated in the robbery of the bishop's purse, and to give that name here might make trouble for her. And yet if she gave her real name, Hester Storm, what would Miss Thompson think?
"I have had such a hard time, especially this last year," she murmured, avoiding the difficulty.
"You must tell me all about it," said the curate kindly. "Come—as we walk along—all about it."
So it befell that Hester Storm, having started out aimlessly along a country road, her mind filled with schemes for getting at Miss Elizabeth Thompson, had, by a lucky chance, fallen in with this guileless and amiable party who actually lived at Ipping House and who might be of the greatest use to her.
As they strolled on, side by side, the girl elaborated for Horatio's benefit the same hard luck story that she had invented for Betty on the train, the same nursery governess struggles, the same disappointments and humiliations, only she did the thing much better for Horatio, having had more practice, and, as she finished, the curate's eyes were filled with tears.
"My dear young lady, I am inexpressibly touched by your misfortunes, believe me, I am deeply affected." The intensity of his emotion, as he spoke these words, caused the reverend gentleman to open his pale blue eyes very wide (and his powerful glasses magnified them still farther) so that Hester thought of him suddenly as a strange, blue-eyed owl bending over her and, to hide her merriment, was forced to turn away.