and brought me some water. I have no idea whether this took any time.

‘Dead?’ said I.

‘He dined in town yesterday, and drove down in the phaeton by himself,’ said Tiffey, ‘having sent his own groom home by the coach, as he sometimes did, you know — ’

‘Well?’

‘The phaeton went home without him.

The horses stopped at the stable-gate. The man went out with a lantern. Nobody in the carriage.’

‘Had they run away?’

‘They were not hot,’ said Tiffey, putting on his glasses; ‘no hotter, I understand, than they would have been, going down at the usual pace. The reins were broken, but they had been dragging on the ground. The house was roused up directly, and three of them went out along the road. They found him a mile off.’