"Mr. George, I thought you told me you had left your horse at Blackstone for Rupert Trevlyn, to save his walking home?"
"Then it's Cris Chattaway who has come home on it. I'd see _him_ far enough before he should have the use of my horse!"
"It can't be," returned George. "You must be mistaken, Nora; Cris had his own horse there."
"You can go and ask for yourself," rejoined Nora, crustily, not at all liking to be told she was mistaken. "Sam Atkins is putting the horse in the stable, and says Cris Chattaway rode it from Blackstone."
George did go and ask for himself. He could not understand it at all; and he had no more fancy for allowing Cris Chattaway the use of his horse than Nora had. He supposed they had exchanged steeds; though why they should do so, he could not imagine.
Sam Atkins was in the stable, talking to Roger, one of the men about the farm. George saw at a glance that his horse had been ridden hard.
"Who rode this horse home?" he inquired, as the groom touched his hat to him.
"Mr. Rupert, sir? I don't think he is come home."
"Where's Mr. Cris Chattaway's own horse?"
"He left it at Blackstone, sir. It fell dead lame, he says. I be going for it now."
George paused. "I lent my horse to Mr. Rupert," he said. "Do you know why he did not use it himself?"
"I don't know nothing about it, sir. Mr. Cris came home just now on your horse, told me to bring it down here, go on to Blackstone for his, and mind I led it gently home. He never mentioned Mr. Rupert."
Considerably later--in fact, it was past nine o'clock--Rupert Trevlyn appeared. George Ryle was leaning over the gate at the foot of his garden in a musing attitude, the bright stars above him, the slight frost of the autumn night rendering the air clear, though not cold, when he saw a figure slowly winding up the road. It was Rupert Trevlyn. The same misfortune seemed to have befallen him that had befallen the horse, for he limped as he walked.
"Lame with fatigue; nothing else," answered Rupert in that low, half-inaudible voice which a very depressed physical state will induce. "Let me come in and sit down half-an-hour, George, or I shall never get to the Hold."
"How came you to let Cris Chattaway ride my horse home? I left it for you."