"You can go on," said George; "some of the men will be about. Should you see Miss Diana, or any of the young ladies, take care you say nothing to them. Do you hear?"
"I'll mind, sir."
Jim Sanders hastened out of the field on his way to the back premises of the Hold, and George flew onwards. When he gained the road, he looked up and down, but could see no traces of the accident. Nothing was in sight. Which way should he turn? Where had it occurred? He began reproaching himself for not asking Jim Sanders which way the horse had been coming from. As he halted in indecision some one suddenly came round the turning of the road lower down. It was Cris Chattaway, with a rueful expression and a gig-whip in his hand.
George made but few strides towards him. "What is the worst, Cris? Let me know it."
"I'll have him taken in charge and prosecuted, as sure as a gun," raved Cris. "I will. It's infamous that these things should be allowed in the public road."
"What—the horse?" exclaimed George.
"Horse be hanged!" politely returned Cris, whose irritation was excessive. "It wasn't the horse's fault. Nothing could go steadier and better than he went all the way and back again, as far as this——"
"Where's Mrs. Chattaway?" interrupted George.
"On the bank, down there. She's all right; only shaken a bit. The fellow's name was on the thing, and I have copied it down, and I've sent a man off for a constable. I'll teach him that he can't go about the country, plying his trade and frightening gentlemen's horses with impunity."
In spite of Cris's incoherence and passion, George contrived to gather an inkling of the facts. They had taken a short, easy drive down the lower road and through Barbrook, the horse going (according to Cris) beautifully. But on the road home, in that lonely part between the Hold and Trevlyn Farm, there stood a razor-grinder with his machine, grinding a knife. Whether the whirr of the wheel did not please the horse; whether it was the aspect of the machine; or whether it might be the razor-grinder himself, a somewhat tattered object in a fur cap, the animal no sooner came near, than he began to dance and backed towards the ditch. Cris did his best. He was a good whip and a fearless one; but he could not conquer. The horse turned Mrs. Chattaway into the ditch, relieved his mind by a few kicks, and started off with part of the shafts behind him.