'I understand—like a fellow saying something unpleasant of one at one's club.'
They came to the end of the green lane at last. It opened upon a level sweep of land, across which they saw the city, all its roofs and walls steeped in the westering sunlight. The ground was marshy, and between low rush-grown banks gently flowed the Ebor, a narrow river that wound its sinuous course around the outskirts of Eborsham, without entering the city.
'I have not led you astray, you see, sir,' said Maurice; 'behold the cathedral. Yonder path by the water's edge will bring us to the lower end of the town.'
'We have to thank you for extrication from a difficulty, sir,' replied Mr. Elgood, with dignity. 'You have brought us a shorter way than that which my daughter and I traversed when we came out this afternoon.'
They followed the river path—a towpath along which slow, clumsy horses were wont to drag the lingering chain of a heavily-laden barge. The dark green rushes shivered in the west wind—the slow river was gently rippled—the city had a look of unspeakable stillness—like a city in a picture.
Half way along the towpath they encountered some stragglers—a man laden with oaken mats, who walked wide of his companions on the marshy ground outside the path—a boy running here and there at random, chasing the small yellow butterflies, and shouting at them in the ardour of the chase—an elderly woman of the gipsy race, carrying a string of light fancy baskets across her shoulder.
'That's the worst of a race meeting,' said James Penwyn, with reference to these nomads. 'It brings together such a lot of rabble.'
One of the rabble stopped and blocked his pathway. It was the elderly gipsy woman.
'Let me tell you your fortune, my pretty gentleman,' she said, pouncing on Mr. Penwyn, as if she had discovered his superior wealth at a glance. 'Cross the poor gipsy's hand with a bit of silver—half a crown won't hurt you—my pretty gentleman. You've riches in your face—you've never known what it is to want a sovereign, and never will. The world was made for such as you.'
'Avaunt, harridan!' cried the tragedian, 'and suffer us to proceed.'