equanimity. By that time I had passed on, raising my hat.
Almost at once Fyne caught me up and slowed down to my strolling gait
which must have been infinitely irksome to his high pedestrian
faculties. I am sure that all his muscular person must have suffered
from awful physical boredom; but he did not attempt to charm it away by
conversation. He preserved a portentous and dreary silence. And I was
bored too. Suddenly I perceived the menace of even worse boredom. Yes!
He was so silent because he had something to tell me.

I became extremely frightened. But man, reckless animal, is so made
that in him curiosity, the paltriest curiosity, will overcome all
terrors, every disgust, and even despair itself. To my laconic
invitation to come in for a drink he answered by a deep, gravely
accented: "Thanks, I will" as though it were a response in church. His
face as seen in the lamplight gave me no clue to the character of the
impending communication; as indeed from the nature of things it couldn't
do, its normal expression being already that of the utmost possible
seriousness. It was perfect and immovable; and for a certainty if he
had something excruciatingly funny to tell me it would be all the same.

He gazed at me earnestly and delivered himself of some weighty remarks
on Mrs Fyne's desire to befriend, counsel, and guide young girls of all
sorts on the path of life. It was a voluntary mission. He approved his
wife's action and also her views and principles in general.

All this with a solemn countenance and in deep measured tones. Yet
somehow I got an irresistible conviction that he was exasperated by
something in particular. In the unworthy hope of being amused by the
misfortunes of a fellow-creature I asked him point-blank what was wrong
now.

What was wrong was that a girl-friend was missing. She had been missing
precisely since six o'clock that morning. The woman who did the work of
the cottage saw her going out at that hour, for a walk. The pedestrian
Fyne's ideas of a walk were extensive, but the girl did not turn up for
lunch, nor yet for tea, nor yet for dinner. She had not turned up by
footpath, road or rail. He had been reluctant to make inquiries. It
would have set all the village talking. The Fynes had expected her to
reappear every moment, till the shades of the night and the silence of
slumber had stolen gradually over the wide and peaceful rural landscape
commanded by the cottage.

A