For his visit to the market town of Stapley Lord Peter attired himself in an aged Norfolk suit, stockings with sober tops, an ancient hat turned down all round, stout shoes, and carried a heavy ashplant. It was with regret that he abandoned his favorite stick—a handsome malacca, marked off in inches for detective convenience, and concealing a sword in its belly and a compass in its head. He decided, however, that it would prejudice the natives against him, as having a town-bred, not to say supercilious, air about it. The sequel to this commendable devotion to his art forcibly illustrated the truth of Gertrude Rhead's observation, "All this self-sacrifice is a sad mistake."
The little town was sleepy enough as he drove into it in one of the Riddlesdale dog-carts, Bunter beside him, and the under-gardener on the back seat. For choice, he would have come on a market-day, in the hope of meeting Grimethorpe himself, but things were moving fast now, and he dared not lose a day. It was a raw, cold morning, inclined to rain.
"Which is the best inn to put up at, Wilkes?"
"There's t' 'Bricklayers' Arms,' my lord—a fine, well-thought of place, or t' 'Bridge and Bottle,' i' t' square, or t' 'Rose and Crown,' t'other side o' square."
"Where do the folks usually put up on market-days?"
"Mebbe 'Rose and Crown' is most popular, so to say—Tim Watchett, t' landlord, is a rare gossip. Now Greg Smith ower t'way at 'Bridge and Bottle,' he's nobbut a grimly, surly man, but he keeps good drink."
"H'm—I fancy, Bunter, our man will be more attracted by surliness and good drink than by a genial host. The 'Bridge and Bottle' for us, I fancy, and, if we draw blank there, we'll toddle over to the 'Rose and Crown,' and pump the garrulous Watchett."
Accordingly they turned into the yard of a large, stony-faced house, whose long-unpainted sign bore the dim outline of a "Bridge Embattled," which local etymology had (by a natural association of ideas) transmogrified into the "Bridge and Bottle." To the grumpy ostler who took the horse Peter, with his most companionable manner, addressed himself:
"Nasty raw morning, isn't it?"