isfactorily accomplished it, and found, by a careful moving
backward and forward of his head, that it is comfortably adjusted, it
occurs to him to see if his companion is weather-proof.

"Got wraps enough?" asks he. "No, by Jove! Here, put on this," dragging
a warm cloak of her own from under the seat and offering it to her with
all the air of one making a gift. "What is it? Coat--cloak--ulster? One
never knows what women's clothes are meant for."

"To cover them," says Joyce calmly.

"Well, put it on. By Jove, how it pours! All right now?" having
carelessly flung it round her, without regard for where her arms ought
to go through the sleeves. "Think you can manage the rest by yourself?
So beastly difficult to do anything in a storm like this, with this
brute tugging at the reins and the rain running up one's sleeve."

"I can manage it very well myself, thank you," says Joyce, giving up the
finding of the sleeves as a bad job; after a futile effort to discover
their whereabouts she buttons the cloak across her chest and sits beside
him, silent but shivering. A little swift, wandering thought of Dysart
makes her feel even colder. If he had been there! Would she be thus
roughly entreated? Nay, rather would she not have been a mark for
tenderest care, a precious charge entrusted to his keeping. A thing
beloved and therefore to be cherished.

"Look there," says she, suddenly lifting her head and pointing a little
to the right. "Surely, even through this denseness, I see lights. Is it
a village?"

"Yes--a village, I should say," grimly. "A hamlet rather. Would you,"
ungraciously, "suggest our seeking shelter there?"

"I think it must be the village called 'Falling,'" says she, too pleased
at her discovery to care about his gruffness, "and if so, the owner of
the inn there was an old servant of my father's. She often comes over to
see Barbara and the children, and though I have never come here to see
her, I know she lives somewhere in this part of the world. A good
creature she is. The kindest of women."

"An inn," says Beauclerk, deaf to the virtues of the old servant, the
innkeeper, but altogether alive to the fact that she keeps an inn. "What
a blessed oasis in our wilderness! And it can't be more than half a mile
away. Why," recovering his usual delightful manner, "we shall find
ourselves housed in no time. I do hope, my dear girl, you are
comfortable! Wrapped up to the chin, eh? Quite right--quite right. After
a