h white gate bearing the legend
"Private," and keeping a thin brown road that ran for a little way
between fair meadows before plunging into a swaying beechwood.

"Anything the matter?" I asked.

Miss Childe laid a hand on my arm.

"Be an angel," she said in a caressing voice.

"Certainly," said I. "With or without wings?"

"And open the gate, so that----"

"I know," I cried, "I know. Don't tell me. 'So that the automobile may
pass unobstructed between the gate-posts.' Am I right?"

"How on earth did you know?"

"Instinct." I open the door and stepped backwards into the road. "I'm
always like this before eating kidneys," I added.

As I re-entered the car--

"Now we can let her out," said Miss Childe contentedly. "It's such a
relief to feel there's no speed limit," she added, with a ravishing
smile.

As soon as I could trust my voice--

"I shouldn't think your chauffeurs live very long, do they?"

"On the contrary, they grow old in our service."

"I can believe you," said I heartily. "I myself have aged considerably
since we left Highlands."

By this time we had flung through and out of the beechwood, and the car
was storming past stretches of gleaming bracken, all red and gold and
stuck with spreading oak trees that stood sometimes alone, sometimes in
groups of two or three together, and made you think of staring cattle
standing knee-deep in a golden flood.

The car tore on.

"We're coming to where I used to gather the mushrooms," my companion
announced.

"Barefoot?"

"Sometimes."

"Because of the dew?"

She nodded.

I sighed. Then--

"Up to now I've been feeling like a large brandy and a small soda," I
said. "Now I feel like a sonnet. What is your name, and who gave you
that name?"

"I'm sure that's not necessary. I've seen a sonnet 'To a lady upon her
birthday.'"

"As you please. Shall I post it to you or pin it to a tree in Battersea
Park?"

Miss Childe nodded her head in the direction in which we were going.

"That," she said, "is the house."

At the end of a long avenue of elms I could see the bold flash of
windows which the afternoon sun had set afire, and a moment later we
swept by the front of an old red mansion and round into a paved court
that lay on its farther side.

Here was a door open, and in front of this my companion brought the car
to a standstill.

I handed her out. She rang the bell and entered. I followed her in.

"Like to look round the house?" said Miss