It was hilly countryside they traversed, for the most part thinly settled. Long stretches of lonely road spaced infrequent clusters of farm buildings and crossroad communities. Few other vehicles were encountered. The Rolls-Royce seldom slowed down to forty miles an hour, while the following car closed up till its headlamps lighted brilliantly both sides of the landaulet, rendering it out of the question as well as foolhardy to seek to leave the latter unobserved by a sudden dive into the dark.
Not that Lanyard entertained the remotest desire to commit his fortunes to a hope so forlorn, he was too well possessed by curiosity concerning the nature of the scheme which Morphew was maturing, for Lanyard's introduction to which he had plotted an approach so tortuous, and which that evening could hardly fail to declare. It wasn't in reason that the man should take so much trouble to manufacture an atmosphere of mystery without a purpose of uncommon moment. And if it were true that he had some more than ordinarily devilish project brewing, Lanyard would feel cruelly slighted if denied a chance to get at least a peep into it.
Something after nine the cars picked their way through the outskirts of a town of good size, then found a by-road through open country fragrant with the breath of salt water, leading on to infer that Long Island Sound could not be far away. Properties jealously enclosed in walls or wrought-iron fences bordered the road, occasional gateways opened up fleeting vistas of drives that led toward lighted windows in the distance. Apparently a community of wealthy land-holders . . .
The landaulet turned in at last between two stone piers supporting handsome iron gates, and followed a winding drive through spacious lawns, dimly revealed by starlight, to a porte-cochère. The footman jumped down to the door, Lanyard alighted. As he ascended steps leading to a broad veranda, he heard the Rolls-Royce purr away behind him, and saw the headlights of its attendant car sweep down the drive that curved round to the rear of the house.
The veranda was lighted only by windows opening on it that diffused a gentle glow at best upon patches of flooring set with summer furniture, and deepened the gloom of the spaces intervening. The house was silent, nobody moved in an imposing entrance-hall that was visible through screen doors; and Lanyard pulled up, at a loss for his welcome.
That came, however, without too much delay: a low sweet laugh lifting up from the darkness between the two nearest windows, then a small shape of beauty and gracious animation running swiftly toward him with both hands extended.
He caught them with an exclamation of pleasure, and stood looking in wonder into the smiling eyes of Folly McFee.
XXI
Neither less nor more the dupe of vanity than most men of his years, Lanyard rather liked to think of himself as one whom life had lessoned out of all susceptibility to such emotions as that of surprise, a creature of sophistication cynical but bland, weathered by arduous experience and long contemplation of man the slave of folly and the feeble sport of chance until nothing could amaze him. But this contretemps (he couldn't count it better, remembering the genius of its machinery) flawed the picture; Folly's accents with their more than half-pretended petulance startled him awake to the fact that he had been holding her hands for minutes, gaping like a zany, speechlessly confounded.