He drew his chair closer to mine, and was about to go on speaking when the servants came in with the coffee.
“Who’s the bell tolling for, Hurst?” he said to the butler.
“I couldn’t say, my lord.”
When the servants had gone Inley continued, at first in a calmer voice:
“Miss Bassett lived in the red cottage just beyond the gate of the South Lodge from time immemorial. You generally came to us in Scotland, I know, but I should think you must have seen her.”
Suddenly a recollection flashed upon me—a recollection of a long, flat figure, a drab face, thin hair coming away from a wrinkled forehead under a mushroom hat, flapping, old-fashioned golden earrings.
“Not the person I used to call ‘the Plank’?” I said.
“Did you?”
He thought for a moment.
“Yes; I believe you did-. I’d forgotten.”