“Not in business. Read it, will you?”
Mr. Crosse read the letter through. “Is it my advice you wish for?” asked he, when he came to the last word.
“Not exactly,” replied Thomas Godolphin. “I have made up my mind, I believe.”
“To go immediately?”
“Yes. Within an hour.”
“Right. It is what I should have recommended you to do, had you been undecided. When it comes to letter-writing with Margery, the thing is serious, rely upon it.”
And within the hour Thomas Godolphin had started.
The railway station nearest to Broomhead, was three miles distant from it, by the road: but there was a shorter cut across some fields—bearing past the house of that Mr. Sandy Bray, if you are curious to know—which reduced it to less than two. It was one of those rural stations so little frequented that travellers are tempted to ask why they were built at all. Such a thing as a fly, or an omnibus, had never yet been seen at it, at midday: you may therefore judge what chance Thomas Godolphin had of either, getting there, as he did, at midnight. He was the only passenger to alight, and the train went puffing on. The man, who lived in the one-roomed cottage close by, and was called the station-master, appeared to be the only official to receive him. A man who had been drafted thither from one of the English lines.
“For Broomhead, sir?” he questioned, recognizing the traveller.
“Yes. Do you happen to know how Sir George Godolphin is?”