"Good-night to you, Mr. Lenine," he said. "I expect I'll find Phoebe over at Cloom. If I do, I'll see her home."
"Good-night to you both," said the miller cordially enough; but when they turned the corner by the wheel he was still peering after them as though beset by some uneasiness.
"Rum old bird," opined Killigrew, as they swung along in the darkness. As they reached the cliff again something brushed through the bushes away to their right, but as they called and no one answered they concluded it was a fox or some other wanderer of the night and went on. Further along still they came on a man leaning against a stone step that crested a wall they had to pass.
He did not move at their approach, and Ishmael touched him on the sleeve.
"Here, we want to pass, please," he said.
"So you want to pass, do you?" said the man, with a slow laugh. "You want to pass …? Well, pass…. I'll not hinder 'ee passing here nor yet to a place that's a sight further on…."
"Archelaus!" exclaimed Ishmael, peering into the darkness. But the man had already moved off and was lumbering down the field, and the sound of his quiet mirth was all that came back to them.
"I really think sometimes that Archelaus must have had a touch of the sun out in Australia," declared Ishmael as they mounted the stile after a brief awkward silence.
"If it's only that …" was all that Killigrew would vouchsafe.
"What do you mean?"