“Tell you what,” he said at the close; “you’ll be able to pick up a little on the road with your singing.  We’ll tramp west to-morrow, and pass ourselves off for man and wife.  Likely we’ll get some farm work, down in the country.  Let’s get out of this.”

They joined hands and started off again, unable to see a foot before them in the blackness.  So it happened next morning that the park-keeper, coming at his usual hour to unlock the gates, found a man and a woman inside with their white faces pressed against the railings, through which they glared like caged beasts.  He set them free, and they ran out, for his paradise was too big.

Now, facing west, they tramped for two days on the Bath road, leaving the fog behind them, and drew near Reading.  It was a clear night as they approached it, and the sky studded with stars that twinkled frostily.  Eleven o’clock sounded from a tower ahead.  On the outskirts of the town they were passing an ugly modern villa with a large garden before it, when an old gentleman came briskly up the road and turned in at the gate.

Adam swung round on his heel and followed him up the path, begging.  Eve hung by the gate.

“No,” said the old gentleman, fitting his latchkey into the door, “I have no work to offer.  Eh?—­Is that your wife by the gate?  Hungry?”

Adam whispered a lie in his ear.

“Poor woman, and to be on the road, in such a state, at this hour! 
Well, you shall share my supper before you search for a lodging. 
Come inside,” he called out to Eve, “and be careful of the step. 
It’s a high one.”

He led them in, past the ground-floor rooms and up a flight of stairs.  After pausing on the landing and waiting a long time for Eve to take breath, he began to ascend another flight.

“Are we going to have supper on the leads?” Adam wondered.

They followed the old gentleman up to the attics and into a kind of tower, where was a small room with two tables spread, the one with a supper, the other with papers, charts, and mathematical instruments.

“Here,” said their guide, “is bread, a cold chicken, and a bottle of whisky.  I beg you to excuse me while you eat.  The fact is, I dabble in astronomy.  My telescope is on the roof above, and to-night every moment is precious.”

There was a ladder fixed in the room, leading to a trap-door in the ceiling.  Up this ladder the old gentleman trotted, and in half a minute had disappeared, shutting the trap behind him.

It was half an hour or more before Adam climbed after him, with Eve, as usual, at his heels.

“My dear madam!” cried the astronomer, “and in your state!”

“I told you a lie,” Adam said.  “I’ve come to beg your pardon.  May we look at the stars before we go?”