keeping such an oath. I've known you before this to be depressed by
circumstances quite as distressing as these, and to be certain that
all hope was over;--but yet you have recovered." This was the only
allusion she had yet made to their former acquaintance. "And now we
must think of getting out of the wood."

"I haven't the slightest idea of the direction of anything."

"Nor have I; but as we clearly can't get out this way we might as
well try the other. Come along. We shall find somebody to put us in
the right road. For my part I'm glad it is no worse. I thought at one
time that you were going to break your neck." They rode on for a few
minutes in silence, and then she spoke again. "Is it not odd, Mr.
Finn, that after all that has come and gone you and I should find
ourselves riding about Broughton Spinnies together?"

CHAPTER XVII

Madame Goesler's Story

"After all that has come and gone, is it not odd that you and I
should find ourselves riding about Broughton Spinnies together?" That
was the question which Madame Goesler asked Phineas Finn when they
had both agreed that it was impossible to jump over the bank out of
the wood, and it was, of course, necessary that some answer should be
given to it.

"When I saw you last in London," said Phineas, with a voice that was
gruff, and a manner that was abrupt, "I certainly did not think that
we should meet again so soon."

"No;--I left you as though I had grounds for quarrelling; but there
was no quarrel. I wrote to you, and tried to explain that."

"You did;--and though my answer was necessarily short, I was very
grateful."

"And here you are back among us; and it does seem so odd. Lady
Chiltern never told me that I was to meet you."

"Nor did she tell me."

"It is better so, for otherwise I should not have come, and then,
perhaps, you would have been all alone in your discomfiture at the
bank."

"That would have been very bad."

"You see I can be quite frank with you, Mr. Finn. I am heartily glad
to see you, but I should not have come had I been told. And when
I did see you, it was quite improbable that we should be thrown
together as we are now,--was it not? Ah;--here is a man, and he can
tell us the way back to Copperhouse Cross. But I suppose we had
better ask for Harrington Hall at once."

The man knew nothing at all about Harrington Hall, and very little
about Copperhouse; but he did direct them on to the road, and they
found that they w