It was a wet July night when Lancaster sought this refuge. All day it had been raining hard, and Jarman was just thinking of putting on his waders for his usual walk, when Miss Cork entered to announce a visitor. On her heels followed Frank, and Eustace stared when he saw him. The stare was excusable, for Lancaster appeared in a silk hat, a frock-coat, and patent-leather boots. He was mired with clay from the roads, torn by the furze of the common, and dripped like an insane river-god. Also, without invitation, he collapsed into the nearest chair, while Jarman's jaw fell still lower at the sight of his white face, his clenched mouth, and his glassy eyes. Miss Cork, half blind, saw few of these things, but she withdrew to the kitchen to soliloquise on the costume of the visitor, inappropriate alike to the weather and the country. Meanwhile Jarman, behind closed doors, continued to stare.
"What is the matter?" he asked at last.
"I caught the last train from Liverpool Street," explained Frank, in faint tones, "and walked across the Common. I'm dead beat. Give me a whisky and soda."
Jarman supplied this refreshment speedily, and again demanded explanations. "But you'd better get into a dry kit before you make 'em," said he, bustling about. "What a crazy rig to negotiate the country in. Been drinkin'?"
"Do I ever drink, you ass?"
"Not your style, I know, but that's the sort that generally goes a mucker in the end. Cut into my bedroom and I'll hand you out a few things. Hang it, man, hold up!"
Lancaster, who had lurched against the big man's shoulder, pulled himself straight, and tried to smile. Jarman could see that the poor young fellow was on the verge of hysterics, being overwrought, and quite broken down. Therefore he spoke roughly to brace the slack nerves. With a few choice expletives he chased Frank into the bedroom, made him strip to the skin, and after a thorough towelling, saw him inducted into a pair of flannel trousers and a faded blazer, together with a woollen shirt and a pair of old slippers. Then he demanded if Frank was hungry, and led him back to the parlour.
"No, I'm not hungry," said Frank, dropping into a chair near the fire, for Eustace approved of a fire when the rain fell; "but another whisky--"
"Not a bit of it. You'll get squiffy. You must eat!"
"But I want to tell you--"