“He is, my Lady, but he’s just after going down to the farm, and he’s going on to call on the English gentleman that’s at Mrs. McKeown’s.”

“And the young ladies?” gasped Lady Purcell.

The answer suited with her fears.  Lady Purcell was not wont to take the initiative, still less one of her husband’s horses, without his approval; but the thought of the saturated side-saddle lent her decision, and as soon as a horse and trap could be got ready she set forth for Drinagh.

It need not for a moment be feared that such experienced campaigners as the Misses Muriel and Nora Purcell had forgotten that their father had settled to call upon their temporary host, what time the business of the morning should be ended, or that they had not arranged a sound scheme of retirement, but when the news was brought to them that during the absence of the stable-boy—­“to borrow a half score of eggs and a lemon for pancakes,” it was explained—­their horses had broken forth from the cowshed and disappeared, it may be admitted that even their stout hearts quailed.

“Oh, it will be all right!” the Inspector assured them, with the easy optimism of the looker-on in domestic tragedy; “your father will see there was nothing else for you to do.”

“That’s all jolly fine,” returned Nora, “but I’m going out to borrow Casey’s car” (Casey was the butcher), “and I’ll just tell old Mary Ann to keep a sharp look out for Sir Thomas, and give us warning in time.”

It is superfluous to this simple tale to narrate the conversation that befel on the departure of Nora.  It was chiefly of a retrospective character, with disquisitions on such abstractions as the consolations that sometimes follow on the loss of a wealthy great-aunt, the difficulties of shaving with a “tennis elbow,” the unchanging quality of certain emotions.  This later topic was still under discussion when Nora burst into the room.

“Here’s Sir Thomas!” she panted.  “Muriel, fly!  There’s no time to get downstairs, but Mary Ann Whooly said we could go into the room off this sitting-room till he’s gone.”

Flight is hardly the term to be applied to the second Miss Purcell’s retreat, and it says a good deal for the Inspector’s mental collapse that he saw nothing ludicrous in her retreating back, clad as it was in his own covert coat, with a blanket like the garment of an Indian brave trailing beneath it.  Nora tore open a door near the fireplace, and revealed a tiny room containing a table, a broken chair, and a heap of feathers near an old feather bed on the floor.

“Get in, Muriel!” she cried.

They got in, and as the door closed on them Sir Thomas entered the room.

During the morning the identity of the stranger on whom he had poured the vials of his wrath, with the Local Government Board Inspector whom he was prepared to be delighted to honour, had been brought home to Sir Thomas, and nothing could have been more handsome and complete than the apology that he now tendered.  He generously admitted the temptation endured in seeing hounds get away with a good fox on a day devoted to cubbing, and even went so far as to suggest that possibly Captain Clarke—­