"He is rather trying to-night, isn't he?" she declared. "Listen! Is that someone going by?"
The footsteps of a man were clearly audible passing along the dusty little strip of road which fronted our cottage. Leaning forward I saw a tall, dark figure pass slowly by. From his height and upright carriage I thought that it must be the village policeman, and I called out good-night. My greeting met with no response. I shrugged my shoulders.
"Some of these village people are not particularly civil!" I remarked.
Mabane rose to his feet and strolled to the hedge.
"Those were not the footsteps of a villager," he remarked. "Listen!"
We stood quite still. The footsteps had ceased, although there was no other habitation for more than half a mile along the road. We could see nothing, but I noticed that Mabane was leaning a little forward and gazing with a curious intentness at the open common on the other side of the road. He stood up presently and knocked the ashes from his pipe.
"What do you say to a drink, Arnold?" he suggested.
"Come along!" I answered. "There's some whisky and soda on the sideboard."
Isobel laughed at us. She would have lingered where she was, but Allan passed his arm through hers.
"Sentiment must not make you lazy, Isobel," he declared. "I decline to mix my own whisky and soda. Arnold," he whispered, drawing me back as she stepped past us through the wide-open window, "I wonder if it has occurred to you that if any of our friends who are so anxious to obtain possession of Isobel were to attempt a coup down here, we should be rather in a mess. We're a mile from the village, and Lord knows how many from a police-station, and there isn't a door in the cottage a man couldn't break open with his fist."