"You find Stonehanger a quiet place?"
Durrell glanced over his shoulder, and his pointed chin looked sharp and forbidding.
"Exquisitely quiet, sir, for me and my books. And the rent is low, a matter of consideration to a scholar. I have tried many places in my time—towns, villages, watering-places. Pah! Distractions everywhere. One of the most difficult things in the world, sir, is to get away from noise and from fools."
He had lit the fire when Nance came in carrying a tray full of breakfast things. Anthony Durrell looked at her with a morose hardening of the face.
"Nance, I will set the table. Go and look after the milk and eggs."
He wanted Nance and Jasper Benham apart. The Chevalier de Rothan's hint had been sufficient.
It was nine o'clock when Jack Bumpstead brought the light wagon into Stonehanger yard, with two of Farmer Crowhurst's horses borrowed for the morning. David Barfoot climbed out. The bottom of the wagon was littered with straw.
When Jasper appeared in the yard, with Durrell walking beside him, Jack Bumpstead joggled his hat, and grinned like a man who had had the best of a bargain.
"Mornin', master; glad I be to see ye alive!"
They had helped Benham into the wagon when Nance came into the yard, carrying a faded, chintz-covered cushion. Jack Bumpstead's blue eyes fixed her with the true Sussex stare.