"You are not fit to go alone," urged the former, while the latter engagingly protruding an elbow, announced that he'd be proud to give her an arm as far as the Hall.
She drew away from this well-meaning squire of dames with such shuddering distaste, and looked once more so white and worn and sickened after her sudden blaze of passion, that Mr. Landale, seeing that the only kindness was to let her have her will, arrested his companion roughly enough, and allowed her to proceed as she wished.
And so, with bent head, Madeleine hurried forth. And the same glorious sun smiled down upon her in her anguish that had greeted her when she hastened an hour before glowing and light-hearted—if, indeed, a heart so full of love could be termed light—to meet her lover; the same brambles caught her dress, the same bird trilled his song. But Madeleine thought neither of ray nor leaf, nor yet of mating songsters: all the spring world, as she went, was to her strewn with the wreck of her broken hopes, and encompassed by the darkness of her lonely future.
Mr. Landale and the preventive service man stood some time watching her retreating figure through the wood, and then walked slowly on for a while, in silent company.
Presently the latter, who during the last part of the interview, had begun to feel a little ruffled by the magistrate's persistently overbearing manner, inquired with something of dudgeon in his voice: "Begging your pardon, sir, what was that I heard the young lady call out just now? 'Gold!' she cries. Is it guineas that nipping young man is a taking over seas, if I may make so bold? Now you see, sir, we haven't had no orders about no gold on this station—that sort of thing is mostly done down south. But what I wants to know is: Why, if you knew all about the fellow's little games, you sent us to spy on him? Ah, poor Nat would want a word or two with you on that score, I fancy! Now it's as plain as Salisbury...."
"But I know nothing certain," impatiently interrupted Mr. Landale. "I know no more than you do yourself. Only not being a perfect idiot, I can put two and two together. What in the name of goodness can a man smuggle out of England but gold? But I wanted the proofs. And your business, it was agreed with the Chief Officer, was to follow my instructions."
"And so we did," grumbled Mr. Hobson; "and a pretty business it's turned out! Nat's to pocket his bludgeoning, I suppose, and I am to bear the blame and lose my share. A cargo of guineas, by God! I might have nosed it, down south, but here.... Blast it! But since you was so clever over it, sir, why in blazes—if I may speak so to a gentleman and a magistrate," pursued the man with a rueful explosion of disgust, "didn't you give me the hint? Why, guineas is contraband of war—it's treason, sir—and guineas is a cargo that's fought for, sir! I shouldn't have moved with two men in a boat patrol, d'ye think? I should have had the riding officers, and the water-guard, and a revenue cruiser in the offing, and all tight and regular. But you would have all the credit, and where are you? and where's my share? and where is Nat?—Bah!"
"You are forgetting yourself, officer," said Mr. Landale, looking severely into the eyes of the disappointed preventive man, whose rising ebullition became on the instant reduced.