He was now shamefully eager to escape that interview with the captain, and relieved to find that there was no need to wait for the friend he had brought to Westways on a vain errand.  Returning to Grey Pine, he explained to his cousin that letters from home made it necessary for him to leave on the mid-afternoon train.  Never did Ann Penhallow more gratefully practise the virtue that speeds the parting guest.  He was sorry to miss the captain and would have the pleasure of sending him a barrel of the best Maryland whisky; “and would you, my dear cousin, say, in your delightful way, to the good rector how much I enjoyed his conversation?”

Ann saw that the lunch was of the best and that the wagon was ready in more than ample season.  As he left, she expressed all the regret she ought to have felt, and as the carriage disappeared at a turn of the avenue she sank down in a chair.  Then she rang a bell.  “Take away that thing,” she said,—­“that spittoon.”

“If James Penhallow were here,” she murmured, “I should ask him to say—­damn!  I wonder now if that man Woodburn will come, and if there will be a difficulty with James on my account.”  She sat long in thought, waiting to greet her husband, while Mr. Grey was left impatient at the station owing to the too hospitable desire of Ann to speed the parting guest.

When about dusk the Squire rode along the road through Westways, he came on the rector and dismounted, leaving his horse to be led home by Pole’s boy.  “Glad to see you, Mark.  How goes it; and how did you like Mr. Grey?”

“To tell you the truth, Squire, I did not like him.  I was forced into a talk about politics.  We differed, as you may suppose.  He was not quite pleasant.  He seemed to have been so mixed up with this sad business about Josiah that I kept away at last, so that I might keep my temper.  Billy drove him to the station after lunch.”

“Indeed!” said Penhallow, pleased that Grey had gone.  It was news to him and not unwelcome.  Ann would no doubt explain.  “What put Grey on the track of Josiah as a runaway?  Was it a mere accidental encounter?” He desired to get some confirmatory information.

“No—­I suspect not.”  Then he related what Josiah had told him of Peter’s threats.  “I may do that reprobate injustice, but—­However, that is all I now know or feel justified in suspecting.”

“Well, come up and dine to-day; we can talk it out after dinner.”

“With pleasure,” said Rivers.

Penhallow moodily walking up the street, his head bent in thought, was made aware that he was almost in collision with Swallow and a large man with a look of good-humoured amusement and the wide-open eyes and uplift of brow expressive of pleasure and surprise.

“By George, Woodburn!” said the Squire.  “I heard some one of your name was here, but did not connect the name with you.  I last heard of you as in a wild mix-up with the Sioux, and I wished I was with you.”  As Penhallow spoke the two men shook hands, Swallow meanwhile standing apart not over-pleased as through the narrowed lids of near-sight he saw that the two men must have known one another well and even intimately, for Woodburn replied, “Thought you knew I’d left the army, Jim.  The last five years I’ve been running my wife’s plantation in Maryland.”