“Mr. Holt,” she said slowly, “I do not know what you mean.”
That was definite enough, and we walked along for some minutes in silence, the while I considered whether I should press her further just then or carry my inquiries in another direction. I was, however, relieved of the responsibility of immediate decision, for at that moment a man turned the bend of the road and, seeing us there, came towards us and greeted Kitty with the familiarity of an old acquaintance. She on her part welcomed him joyfully, though whether that was from pleasure at seeing him or because he provided a way of escape from further questioning, I did not attempt to decide.
The new-comer was tall and rather heavily built and gave an impression of immense physical strength. His manner was bluff and frank and his eyes kindly and intelligent, but the lines of his mouth were hard, as of a man who had had to fight his way and would be little likely to give quarter to an opponent. He looked like one who wanted much anything he did want, and would leave nothing undone that might secure it. “Honest in a way, but a tough customer,” was my own private summary, and I wondered who the man was.
“I was just going to Hapforth House,” he said, smiling, as he addressed Kitty Clevedon, though the stare he bestowed on me was none too friendly.
I noticed that Kitty made no move to introduce us.
“Oh, yes, Auntie told me she was expecting you—some business matter, isn’t it?” she said. “I warn you there may be a warm half-hour before you. Good-bye, Mr. Holt. It was very kind of you to come this far with me. Mr. Thoyne is going my way.”
I accepted my dismissal smilingly and made a careful note in my mind of the man’s name. Anyone with whom Miss Kitty Clevedon was acquainted became a person of interest worth knowing. On my way to Stone Hollow I met Dr. Crawford, a Scot, rough of tongue and occasionally almost brutal in manner; but he was implicitly trusted by the Dale folk, who regarded suavity and gentleness with suspicion, and politeness as a form of hypocrisy. He had come to them from a country even wilder and sterner than their own, and was thus able to fit in with their moods and to understand their temperament, which, to strangers, seemed to be compounded of a mixture of sullenness and stupidity. He was one of the very few people in the Dale with whom I had struck up any sort of intimacy, possibly because he had been my late aunt’s medical attendant and a witness to the will that had given me Stone Hollow.
“Do you happen to know a man named Thoyne?” I asked after a few preliminary remarks.
“Yes; don’t you know him?”
“Am I supposed to? Is he one of those persons whom not to know is proof of one’s own insignificance?”