Kingsleigh is the station for Byestry, which is eight miles from it. It is a small town, not much larger than a mere village, lying, as its name designates, on the shores of the estuary, which runs from the sea up to Kingsleigh. Chorley Old Hall stands on high wooded land, about a mile from the coast, having a view across the estuary, and out to the sea itself.
It was a grey day, with a fine mist of a rain descending, when Antony, with Josephus at his heels, stepped on to Kingsleigh platform. In the road beyond the station, a number of carts and carriages, and a couple of closed buses, were collected. The drivers of the said vehicles stood by the gate through which the passengers must pass, ready to accost those by whom they had been already ordered, or pounce upon likely fares.
“Be yü Michael Field?” demanded a short wiry man, as Antony, carrying an old portmanteau, and followed by Josephus, emerged through the gate.
For a moment Antony stared, amazed. Then he remembered.
“I am,” he replied.
“That’s güd,” responded the man cheerfully. “’It the first nail, so to speak. T’Doctor sent I wi’ t’trap. Coom along. Got any more baggage?”
Antony replied in the negative. Three minutes later he was seated in the trap, Josephus at his feet. He turned up the collar of his mackintosh, and pulled down his tweed cap over his eyes.
“Bit moist-like,” said the man cheerfully, whipping up his horse.
Antony assented. He was feeling an amazing sense of amusement. The adventurous side of the affair had sprung again to the fore, after a week of business-like detail,—writing letters of instruction to Riffle to carry on with the farm till further notice, an office he was fully qualified to fulfil; making certain arrangements with Lloyd’s bank regarding monies to be sent out to him; buying garments suitable for the part he himself was about to play; and having one or two further interviews with Messrs. Parsons and Glieve, in which the absolute necessity of his playing up to his rôle in every way was further impressed upon him.
The one difficulty that had presented itself to his mind, was his speech. He spent several half hours conversing with himself in broadest Devonshire, but finally decided that, it being the speech of the natives, he might sooner or later betray himself by some inadvertent lapse. Next he attempted a Colonial accent. James Glieve, however, being consulted on the subject, it was firmly negatived as likely to prove unpopular. In the end he fell back on a strong Irish accent. It came to him readily enough, the nurse of his childhood having hailed from the Emerald Isle. Possibly his actual phraseology would not prove all it might be, but the Devonians were not likely to be much the wiser. Anyhow Antony admired his own prowess in the tongue quite immensely.