Mrs. Cricklander and Lady Maulevrier had already entered the motor and
were surveying the scene with amused interest, while Miss Lutworth and
Lord Freynault, chaperoned by Arabella Clinker, were preparing to walk.
It was not more than a mile across the park, and it was a glorious day.
John Derringham joined them.

"I think I will come with you, too," he said. "You take my place, Sir
Tedbury. It is only fair you should drive one way."

And so it was arranged, not altogether to the satisfaction of the
hostess, who would have preferred to have walked also. However, there
was nothing to be done, and so they were whizzed off, while with the
tail of her eye Cecilia Cricklander perceived that Lord Freynault had
been displaced from Cora's side and was now stalking behind the other
pair, beside Arabella Clinker.

"What an extraordinary sight that was," she said to Sir Tedbury Delvine
as they went along. "I thought no villagers curtsied any more now in
England. That very funny-looking old lady might have been a royalty!"

"It is because she has never had a doubt but that she is--or something
higher--complete owner of all these souls," he returned, "that they have
not yet begun to doubt it either. They and their forebears have bobbed
to the La Sarthe for hundreds of years, and they will go on doing it if
this holder of the name lives to be ninety-nine. They would never do so
to any new-comer, though, I expect."

"But I am told they have not a penny left, and have sold every acre of
the land except the park. Is it not wonderful, Kitty?" Mrs. Cricklander