lesome that the man decided to
take him back to the town, to have the stone pulled there. He was just
starting to lead him back when I came up with them. He asked me some
question in a tongue which I did not know. He probably asked me if I had
a hook. I shook my head. The lady said something to him in French, which
made him laugh. Then he began to lead back the horse towards the town.
The lady, after waving her hand to him, started to ride slowly forward
in front of me. Like most ladies at that time she wore a little black
velvet domino mask over her eyes. All people could ride in those days;
but I remember it occurred to me that this lady rode beautifully. So
many women look like meal-sacks in the saddle. This one rode as though
she were a part of the horse.

She kept about twenty yards ahead of me till I sighted the inn, where an
ostler was walking the little nag which I was to ride. She halted at the
inn-door, looking back towards the town for her companion. Then, without
calling to anybody, she dismounted, flinging her mare's reins over a
hook in the wall. She went into the inn boldly, drawing her whip through
her left hand. When I entered the inn-door a moment later, she was
talking in Dutch to the landlord, who was bowing to her as though she
were a great lady.

I handed over my bottle-basket, with the letter, to a woman who served
the customers at the drinking bar. Then, as I was going out to take my
horse, the lady spoke to me in broken English.

"Walk my horse, so he not take cold," she said. It was in the twilight
of the passage from the door, so that I could not see her very clearly,
but the voice was certainly like the voice of the woman who had fired
at me in the courtyard. Or was I right? That voice was on my nerves. It
seemed to be the voice of all the strangers in the town. I looked up at
her quickly. She was masked; yet the grey eyes seemed to gleam beyond
the velvet, much as that woman's eyes had gleamed. Her mouth; her chin;
the general poise of her body, all convinced me. She was the woman who
had carried away the book from Longshore Jack. I was quite sure of it.
I pretended not to understand her. I dropped my eyes, without stopping;
she flicked me lightly with her whip to draw my attention.

"Walk my horse," she said again, with a little petulance in her voice. I
saw no way out of it. If I refused, she would guess (if she did not
know already) that I was not there only for bottles of gin. "Oui,