By the time she drew rein and allowed me to get alongside of her once more, we were in sight: of Moldwarp Hall. It stood with one corner towards us, giving the perspective of two sides at once. She stopped her mare, and said,
‘There, Wilfrid! What would you give to call a place like that your own? What a thing to have a house like that to live in!’
{Illustration: “NOW THERE’S A LITTLE FENCE,” SHE SAID.}
‘I know something I should like better,’ I said.
I assure my reader I was not so silly as to be on the point of making her an offer already. Neither did she so misunderstand me. She was very near the mark of my meaning when she rejoined—
‘Do you? I don’t. I suppose you would prefer being called a fine poet, or something of the sort.’
I was glad she did not give me time to reply, for I had not intended to expose myself to her ridicule. She was off again at a gallop towards the Hall, straight for the less accessible of the two gates, and had scrambled the mare up to the very bell-pull and rung it before I could get near her. When the porter appeared in the wicket—
‘Open the gate, Jansen,’ she said. ‘I want to see Mrs Wilson, and I don’t want to get down.’
‘But horses never come in here, Miss,’ said the man.
‘I mean to make an exception in favour of this mare,’ she answered.