"Well, Mrs. Willis, I hear you have something to tell me?"
"Indeed no, sir," exclaimed the woman, picking nervously at her gloves. "It is nothing at all. Only when I 'eard you asking about carriages in the night, I says to Mrs. Jones—well, one passed, I know that. Leastways, it didn't exactly pass; it stayed."
"The carriage stayed; where?"
"It wasn't a carriage."
"It wasn't a carriage and it stayed? Can't you explain yourself more clearly, Mrs. Willis? This isn't a conundrum, is it?"
"It was a car, a motor-car," stammered the woman.
"A car! And it stopped? Where?"
"I couldn't say exactly, but not far from our cottage."
"And where is your cottage?"
"On the 'ighroad near the long lane."