George watched him away as he strode with a firm, quick, elastic step towards the Folly. George wondered when he should walk again with the same step. Perhaps the idea, or the desire to do so, impelled him to try it then. He rose from his seat and went tottering out, drawing his sticks with him. It was a tempting morning, and George strolled on in its brightness, resting now on one bench, now on another, and then bearing on again.
“I might get as far as the Folly, if I took my time,” he said to himself. “Would it not be a surprise to them!”
So he bore onwards to the Folly, as the stranger had done. He was drawing very near to it, was seated, in fact, on the last bench that he intended to rest on, when Mr. Verrall passed him.
“Have you had a gentleman inquiring for you?” George asked him.
“What gentleman?” demanded Mr. Verrall.
“A stranger. He came to Ashlydyat, supposing you lived there. I sent him to the Folly.”
“Describe him, will you?” said Mr. Verrall.
“I noticed nothing much to describe,” replied George. “He wore a straw hat, and had a thin tweed coat over his arm. I should fancy he had just come off a journey.”
Mr. Verrall left George where he was, and went back to the Folly. George rose and followed more slowly. But when he got beyond the trees, he saw that Mr. Verrall must have plunged into them: as if he would go into the Folly by the servants’ entrance. George crossed the lawn, and made straight for the drawing-room windows, which stood open.
Scarcely had he entered, and flung himself into the first easy-chair, when he saw the same stranger approach the house. Where had he been, not to have found it before? But George immediately divined that he had taken the wrong turning near the ash-trees, and so had had the pleasure of a round to Prior’s Ash and back again. The room was empty, and George sat recovering breath and enjoying the luxury of a rest, when the stranger’s knock resounded at the hall-door.