“You’ll have to put up with it for once,” returned Barrant curtly, in no way softened by the odour of Mr. Crows’ breath.

As this was a reply which no resident of St. Fair would have dared to make, Mr. Crows bent a muddled glance on his fare, and by a concentrated effort recalled the face of the man who had given him ten shillings on the previous night.  He decided to pocket the present indignity in the hope of another tip.

“Aw right,” he said, with unwonted amiability, “yewer can stay where yew are—­for wance.”

He applied himself to driving the wagonette.  Sobriety was not an essential of the feat.  The horse knew the way, drew clear of the town without accident, and jogged into the long winding road which stretched across the moors.  The shadows deepened into night, and Mr. Crows lighted a solitary lamp in the front of his vehicle.

“Aren’t you going to light up inside?” asked Barrant, when the lamp was flickering faintly.

“No,” replied Mr. Crows shortly.  “It don’t pay.  Let ’em set in the dark.”

“Not enough passengers, eh?”

“Moren enough fat old wommen on the out journey,” declared Mr. Crows passionately.  “That’s because it’s all up-hill.  But they walk in downhill to save a shellen. I know them.”  He brooded darkly.  “It’s all part of the plan,” he went on.  Then, as though feeling that this latter statement, in itself, erred on the side of vagueness, he added—­“to worrit a man.”

“How many passengers did you have on your last journey in, last night?”

“Two on ’em.”  Mr. Crows, with forefinger and thumb, snuffed his nose as he had previously snuffed the candle in the lamp.  “There was Peter Portgartha and a young woman.  I happen to know it was a young ’un because she went away at such a rate when she got out.  When wommen begins to get up in years they go in the legs, same as harses.”

“Would you know her again if you saw her?” asked Barrant eagerly.

“Not if you was to sware me on the Howly Trinity.”

“Did this young woman travel up with you by this wagonette last night?”

Mr. Crows couldn’t say for that.  There were six insides, that was all he knew.  He disremembered anything about them.

“Surely you notice the passengers you carry?”

Mr. Crows, with the air of one propounding an insoluble riddle, asked his fare why should he take notice of his passengers?  He weren’t paid for that—­no, not he.  What’s more, the night was a dark one.  He knew there was six insides because six fares was put through the winder, but whether they was put through by men or ma’adens or widder wommen was moren he cud say.

He again called on the Trinity to attest his ignorance.

“Their shellens is nuthin’ to me”—­the reference was to the passengers.  “They wouldn’t pay for the harse’s feed.  I work for the Duchy, I do, which is almost the same as being in Guvverment, ain’t it?  I remember yew, thow—­because yew gave me ten shellens for driving yew to the Central hotel last night.”  Mr. Crows cast a quick glance at his fare to see how he took this artful reminder of his munificence.  “But as for their bobs—­” He spat into the night in order to express his contempt for the insignificance of such small sums.