"That's true," said Helmsley, gently; "but I shall not. Good-bye!"
"Good-bye!" Miss Tranter paused in her knitting. "Which road are you going from here?"
Helmsley thought a moment.
"Perhaps," he said at last, "one of the main roads would be best. I'd rather not risk any chance of losing my way."
Miss Tranter stepped out of the bar and came to the open doorway of the inn.
"Take that path across the moor," and she pointed with one of her bright knitting needles to a narrow beaten track between the tufted grass, whitened here and there by clusters of tall daisies, "and follow it as straight as you can. It will bring you out on the highroad to Williton and Watchett. It's a goodish bit of tramping on a hot day like this, but if you keep to it steady you'll be sure to get a lift or so in waggons going along to Dunster. And there are plenty of publics about where I daresay you'd get a night's sixpenny shelter, though whether any of them are as comfortable as the 'Trusty Man,' is open to question."
"I should doubt it very much," said Helmsley, his rare kind smile lighting up his whole face. "The 'Trusty Man' thoroughly deserves trust; and, if I may say so, its kind hostess commands respect."
He raised his cap with the deferential easy grace which was habitual to him, and Miss Tranter's pale cheeks reddened suddenly and violently.
"Oh, I'm only a rough sort!" she said hastily. "But the men like me because I don't give them away. I hold that the poor must get a bit of attention as well as the rich."
"The poor deserve it more," rejoined Helmsley. "The rich get far too much of everything in these days,—they are too much pampered and too much flattered. Yet, with it all, I daresay they are often miserable."