He swung in mid-air. The open fields came swimming up to him like vast green waves, gently to splash upon his face, hanging over him, laced about the telegraph poles, rising and falling with them. . . .
The voice of the old man with the long white beard, the only occupant of the carriage with him, broke sharply in like a steel knife cutting through blotting-paper.
"Pardon me, but there is a spider on your neck!"
Harkness started up. The two books slipped to the floor. He passed his hand, damp with the afternoon warmth, over his cool neck. He hated spiders. He shivered. His fingers were on the thing. With a shudder he flung it out of the window.
"Thank you," he said, blushing very slightly.
"Not at all," the old man said severely; "you were almost asleep, and in another moment it would have been down your back."
He was not the old man you would have expected to see in an English first-class carriage, save that now in these democratic days you may see any one anywhere. But first-class fares are so expensive. Perhaps that is why it is only the really poor who can afford them. The old man, who was thin and wiry, had large shabby boots, loose and ancient trousers, a flopping garden straw hat. His hands were gnarled like the knots of trees. He was terribly clean. He had blue eyes. On his knees was a large basket and from this he ate his massive luncheon—here an immense sandwich with pieces of ham like fragments of banners, there a colossal apple, a monstrous pear—
"Going far?" munched the old man.
"No," said Harkness, blushing again. "To Treliss. I change at Trewth, I believe. We should be there at 4.30."
"Should be" said the old man, dribbling through his pear. "The train's late. . . . Another tourist," he added suddenly.