The Quiet Gentleman

Mr. Leek stroked his chin. "Well, now, is that so?" he said. "Evesleigh! Ah! Unless I'm mistook, which don't often happen, that's all of ten miles, guv'nor. Done to a cow's thumb, that's what you'll be!"

"Oh, no!" the Earl said calmly.

Mr. Leek relapsed into silence, which remained unbroken until the grays turned into a narrow lane, when he was moved to point out to the Earl that this was not, according to his information, the road to Evesleigh.

"Not the most direct road to Evesleigh," the Earl corrected.

"O'course I ain't what you might call familiar with these parts," said Mr. Leek. "I'm bound to say, however, that it queers me why a cove—why a gentleman as come as near to slipping his wind as what you done, me lord, should take and drive down a lane which is as rough as this here lane."

"Why, I have a reason for doing so!" said the Earl amiably.

Mr. Leek, himself far from enjoying the rough surface, said severely: "Nice set-out it'll be if that hole you've got in you was to open again, me lord! Asking your pardon, it'll be bellows to mend with you, if the claret starts to flow."

But the Earl only smiled. Through what seemed to his companion a network of country lanes he drove his horses, never seeming to be at a loss for the way. Mr. Leek said grudgingly that he must know the countryside very well to be able to take such a roundabout way to his destination. "I do," the Earl replied. "I have lately ridden over every inch of this ground. One never knows when familiarity with the country will stand one in good stead." He began to check his horses as he spoke, and as the curricle rounded a bend in what was little more than a cart-track Mr. Leek perceived that a farm-gate blocked the way. Knowing well who would have to climb down from the curricle to open this gate (and possibly several more gates), he cast an unloving look at the Earl's profile.

The grays came to a standstill, "If you please!" said the Earl.

Mr. Leek alighted ponderously. The gate was a heavy one, and he was obliged to lift the end before it would pass over the cart-ruts. The curricle moved forward, and stopped again a few yards beyond the gate. As Mr. Leek, who, being country-bred, had no thought of leaving it open, was shutting it again, the Earl spoke to him over his shoulder. "You will have to forgive me, Leek," he said. "Really, I bear you no ill-will, and I am quite sure your interest in me is friendly, but, you see, I don't like being followed. You are now midway between Evesleigh and Stanyon: if I were you I would walk back rather than forward."

"Hi!" exclaimed Mr. Leek, abandoning the gate, and starting towards the curricle. "Hi, guv'nor!"

The grays were already moving. Mr. Leek broke into a run, but his years and his bulk were against him, and he very soon abandoned a hopeless chase, and stood with labouring chest and heated countenance, staring resentfully after the curricle until it vanished round a bend in the lane. "Grassed!" he said bitterly. "Well, may I shove the tumbler if ever I been made to look blue by a mouth afore!" He removed his hat, and mopped his face and head with a large handkerchief. After a moment's reflection, he added, with reluctant respect: "Which he ain't—not by a very long way he ain't!"

Having by this time recovered his breath, he resettled the hat on his head, and turned to find his way back to Stanyon. The deeply rutted lane made walking far from pleasant; and since he was quite lost, and had little expectation of receiving succour, his only consolation lay in the hope that several more cattle-gates stood between the Earl and his goal.