“Where does this road go?” I asked.
“The road—where does it go?” he repeated, mumbling his words from a mouth that was evidently all but toothless, “wey, it goes over yonder”—and he pointed vaguely into the grey distance.
“How far is it to the next village?”
“Oh aye, that’ll be Little Upton, a matter of seven mile maybe and maybe twelve.”
He turned abruptly away and continued his walk towards the coast.
The road ran desolate and unfrequented, with open moorland on either side, as grim and forbidding as open moorland can be in early spring before winter has taken its final departure. The little fishing hamlet lay behind me hidden by the rising ground, while before and around me were only illimitable open spaces within an unbroken pall of grey sky overhead—no sign of human habitation anywhere visible. I decided that Ilbay was the more attractive and that I had nothing to gain by going on.
And it was just here at the loneliest and dreariest turn of the road that I met Ronald Thoyne again coming towards me with long, swinging strides. He stopped and faced me with a rather twisted grin.
“Still on the trail, Mr. Holt?” he said, with half a sneer: “Any discoveries?”
“Several,” I returned cheerfully. “I am, in short, getting on.”
“You must possess a really attractive collection of mare’s-nests,” he retorted.