She asked how my ankle did. When I told her, and added that I must
catch an early train back to Aber, she merely said, "I will walk to the
station with you, if I may."
And so at ten o'clock--after I had bidden farewell to Uncle Melchior,
who wore the air of one interrupted in a long sum of compound addition--
we set forth. I knew the child had something on her mind, and waited.
Once, by a ruinous fountain where a stone Triton blew patiently at a
conch-shell plugged with turf, she paused and dug at the mortared joints
of the basin with the point of her sunshade; and I thought the
confidence was coming. But it was by the tumble-down gate at the end of
the chestnut avenue that she turned and faced me.
"I knew you yesterday at once," she said. "You write novels."
"I wish," said I feebly, "the public were as quick at discovering me."
"Somebody printed an 'interview' with you in '--'s Magazine a month or
two ago."
"There was not the slightest resemblance."
"Please don't be silly. There was a photograph."
"Ah, to be sure."
"You can help me--help us all--if you will."
"Is it about Fritz?"
She bent her head and signed to me to open the gate. Across the
high-road a stile faced us, and a little church, with an acre framed in
elms and set about with trimmed yews. She led the way to the low and
whitewashed porch, and pushed open the iron-studded door. As I
followed, the name of Van der Knoope repeated itself on many mural
tablets. Almost at the end of the south aisle she paused and lifted a
finger and pointed.